Photographers Jada and David Parrish turned their move from Richmond, Virginia, to Los Angeles into a mobile art project: a handcrafted portrait set built into the bed of their 2006 Toyota Tacoma. They plan to keep the set and camera in place while driving to landscapes that become part of each photograph. The creators now describe the route as about 7,500 miles, an expansion from the project page’s earlier 7,000-plus-mile estimate.
How the truck becomes a photography studio
The idea is to carry a controlled studio environment into places a conventional studio cannot go. The Tacoma’s bed holds a reverse forced-perspective tunnel assembled from connected, flat-like panels. At the far end, a large opening frames the view beyond the truck, so the landscape is not just a background: it completes the composition.
Rather than rebuilding the set for every location, the Parrishes intend to hold the camera and set in place and change the scene by repositioning the truck. A shift from dunes to forest to coastline changes what appears inside the same carefully composed frame. Jada Parrish described the relationship succinctly in the duo’s Day 2 build diary: “The landscape is really the final piece of the set.”
Why the set is difficult to build
A structure that works as a photo set must also work as cargo on a long road trip. The creators describe a balancing act between light weight, strength and modular construction. The panels need to fit together in the pickup bed, tolerate sun, wind, temperature changes and possible rain, and support people standing or climbing on them. The sources identify connected flat-like pieces and materials including plywood and paint, but do not specify a plywood grade or a complete construction plan.
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- Low weight versus strength: Reducing the load matters on the road, but the structure still needs to hold its shape and bear people’s weight.
- Studio design versus travel exposure: A set that looks finished in a controlled workspace must also face changing outdoor conditions during a multiweek journey.
- Visual depth versus truck-bed space: The tunnel needs enough depth to create its forced-perspective effect within the pickup’s limited footprint.
Lighting portraits against changing landscapes
The project also has to make the set’s interior readable without losing the landscape framed beyond it. Daylight, weather and location will change along the route, so relying on ambient light alone would make the look difficult to control. The Parrishes say they selected Flashpoint lighting to integrate into the set’s sides and planned to diffuse it. Their sources do not identify exact light or camera models, so the setup is best understood as a design approach rather than a replicable gear specification.
That arrangement reflects the project’s central tension: the set and its lighting aim for consistency, while the outdoor view remains unpredictable. The changing conditions are both a practical challenge and the source of variation that makes each location photograph distinct.
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The planned route and the mileage discrepancy
The creators’ route update describes an itinerary of about 7,500 miles, roughly 2,500 miles longer than the earlier 7,000-plus-mile estimate on their project page. A September 2026 Fstoppers feature also describes the trip as 7,500 miles. Those figures describe the plan as reported by the creators, not an independently measured distance for a completed journey.
Stops named in the route update include Cape Cod, Sleeping Bear Dunes and the Great Lakes, Ozark National Forest, Great Sand Dunes, the Grand Canyon, Utah, Bonneville Salt Flats, Oregon, Big Sur and Los Angeles. They are intended waypoints; the route description does not establish that every stop has been reached. The project page gives a schedule of 25-plus days, also a creator-reported plan.
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Who is behind the project, and what comes next?
Jada and David Parrish are a photography and set-design duo. They conceived the journey around their move from Richmond to Los Angeles, making the relocation itself the framework for a larger creative experiment. Jada’s Fstoppers feature captures the spirit of that approach: “You really can make art out of almost anything. Sometimes you just have to look at the thing you were already going to do and ask what else it could become.”
The duo has described plans for daily road updates and for the resulting work to become a documentary, a fine-art book and a gallery exhibition. These are intended future outputs, not confirmed releases; the cited project materials do not establish that a book or documentary is currently available.
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