I searched the thread and no one mentioned Gamma Correction.

A lot of people are having issues with the lighting on their characters. While I am not very happy with the actual model details and the seemingly Alpha state of the graphical update in the benchmark, you may be able to fix the lighting in the benchmark. In game you may have adjusted your gamma correction from the default 50 to lower. The Benchmark also defaults to 50, and you have to change it manually compared to in-game. If you think the lighting is especially bad and your character seems to glow or is "washed-out," please check the gamma and post.