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It’s a Jeep Thing – in Kodak TMAX-100 4″x5″ film

Blog, Featured by James Pratt Leave a Comment on It’s a Jeep Thing – in Kodak TMAX-100 4″x5″ film

It is the start of summer, so naturally we pulled the top off of our Jeep Wrangler Rubicon JL. I was looking for a place to drive on on recent early Saturday morning, and chanced upon a “Jeeps and Java” gathering in nearby Harrah. I have also been wanting to dust off my Toyo VX-125 large format 4″x5″ film camera and take some photos. So I took it as an opportunity to drive our Jeep and take pictures with my 4×5 film camera.

I love taking portraits. I find people very interesting. And one interesting thing I have observed is that many people like to customize their Jeep Wranglers to fit their personality and the types of exploring they like to do. So I decided to start a film portrait series titled – what else – “It’s a Jeep Thing”. Portraits of people with their Jeep Wranglers, shot on black and white large-format film.

This is my first in hopefully a long series of images. These were taken at the Jeeps and Java gathering in Harrah, Oklahoma on June 12, 2021. Enjoy.

This couple inherited this Jeep Wrangler YJ from his father, who had used it around the farm in west Texas. The owner spent COVID lockdowns fixing up and tweaking this YJ to his liking. It still had the original paint, but he added wheels, winch, bumpers, top, and several other items to customize it to his liking. It is a beautiful, well-preserved example of the square-headlight YJ Jeeps.
This couple had built up their Jeep JK Unlimited for off-roading with a winch, a lift kit, nerf bars, wheels and tires, plus underbody protection. They lived on a dirt road, hence the name for the Jeep. I happened to have some Ilford HP5 film loaded in a holder and shot it with the same exposure and development time as TMAX 100. Turned out slightly overdeveloped but I was able to pull it back in Lightroom. On the right side of the image is where I accidentally opened the film holder just a tad and overexposed that part of the image. Luckily it didn’t ruin the picture.
This was a mostly-stock Rubicon JK with a few mods. The little girl claimed she was the owner, and she just let her parents drive it occasionally.
This is the family that owns the Java coffee shop in Harrah that hosted the event. They actually own two Jeep JK’s – his and hers. This was the husband’s highly modified JK Unlimited 4-door. Her Wrangler was a mostly stock 4-door Sahara. Once again, this was shot on Ilford HP5 film rated at ISO-400 rather than Kodak TMAX-100. This sheet was exposed the same as the ISO-100 TMAX and developed the same. The fact that I got usable images from both ISO-400 and ISO-100 film developed exactly the same shows the flexibility of black and white film.
This is a highly-modified 2-door Rubicon JK with custom fenders, bumpers, winch, a pretty significant lift kit with adjustable arms, and extensive underbody protection. This Wrangler was made for “wheeling”.
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James Pratt

James Pratt

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I am an Oklahoma based writer, commercial photographer, editorial photographer and adventurer based in Oklahoma City. I love telling stories about people. A motorcycle is my preferred means of travel, and I have over 5,000 hours piloting small airplanes. My editorial photography has been published in hundreds of magazines and my commercial photography has been used by dozens of companies worldwide.

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