Finishing benches are where credits go to be spent confidently and, too often, wastefully. An upscale cannot repair a wrong face; a swap cannot rescue a frame that never matched its card. In the letter archive, no frame travels to a finishing bench until it has passed five checks, each scored against the filed entry.
The five checks
1. Identity. Face, hair and signature against the card, at working size.
2. Hands. Fingers counted, joins clean, no merges with props or fabric.
3. Light. One source, behaving consistently across skin, satin and shelving.
4. Edges. Hair against the shelves, fingers against the folder, lace against skin.
5. Purpose. Does the frame do the one job it was briefed for?
The threshold that saves money
Score each check out of two; eight of ten earns finishing spend — an edit at 21 credits, a swap at 26, an upscale at 61. Below eight, the frame returns to the generator at 6 credits, where correction is cheapest. Note the scores on the back of the card and re-file it with the set.