I polished my Barbaros with a dremmel, white polishing compound, jeweler's rouge, simichrome, and then flitz. Just the handle and the top cap. Mostly the handle.
Mine will never come up to the same finish as the Wolfman mirror finish I've seen with the tools and products I have. Not unless I try and spend an insane amount of time on it.
There's just too many tooling marks on the handle. Mostly in the channels and grooves. There's a few little dings. Not really any serious scratches on mine after I finished. Not really when I started either.
I did one side first and then compared.
I had to go all the way after that. I didn't really take a lot of pictures. It's hard to see the difference in pictures anyways.
It's a night and day difference I think. I didn't think it would bother me the other day. I had a little time to mess around with it this afternoon so I did. It looks spectacular now so I'm kind of glad I did.
There's a few little dings and dents here and there. Nothing on the head that interferes with shaving and nothing on the handle that's obvious without a close inspection.
I looked at another artisan handle I own. Jergen Hemple Ti UFO handle. Had I looked at it as critically as I did the Barbaros when I got it, I'd have been more fired up then I am about the Barbaros.
The Ti handle I have has more issues then the Barbaros handle I got does. Mostly really sloppy threads that won't work with every razor head I have. It has a matte finish, but it's hardly refined and finished to the same level as I'd like.
What's my point?
I don't really know.
You guys got me paranoid and looking critically at things I wouldn't normally have been concerned about.
So, I'm done with nit picking my Barbaros.
I'm saving my critical attention to detail for future high dollar investments.
I will check back to see the input and opinions posted if and when someone who has the different razors for comparison chimes in to answer OP's original question.
I don't own the Blackbird or Seygus so I'm interested in the comparisons too myself.