"Cogs Have No Concept, Episode 00: Beyond Reach" was planned to be a 30 page plus comic project to enter the comic market. It was fairly ambitious in scope and visual appearance but was scrapped due to what I perceived as a decline in the comic market and a reluctance of publishers to try such a left field visual style. Publishers did like the work but seemed at a loss as to how to market it in a primarily CG colored comics market. I'm not so bold as to say the work was perfect but as said above I got very good appraisals of the material but the decision to do something "original" visually is where they shied away. What some of the publishers did say was that I should be pursuing production design work for film, well two years later that is where we're at here with vulne pro.

The work was set in the Basilea story arc, and is quite dense and detailed. Heavy influence from Forties' film noir sets the mood and harkens back to the hard-boiled detective yarns, with a large dose of conspiratorial paranoia added. Now these pages are being converted to image art for the TV proposal. The Beyond Reach story is also part of the TV project's secondary pitch.

Pencil shaded with blending stumps then coated with polyurethane to boost contrast and create a vintage aged look. This tinting method is a visual cue I use on quite a few pieces now.