STRUGGLE
Creative Direction
Research
Identity
Merchandise
Photography
Videography
10th Planet × Dark Side United
In 2024, the UFC was valued at $11.3 billion, and MMA is the fastest growing sport on earth. What are audiences getting from MMA — and Jiu Jitsu particularly — that they can’t find anywhere else?
Is it really a Bloodsport thriving at the tail end of an Empire? Or is it evidence of a culture grasping for authenticity, something that we should embrace at every level of the entertainment industry, and the brand and marketing that stands it up? In 2020, I found my answers.
10th PLANET MMA
In 2003, Eddie Bravo opened his first 10th Planet Jiu–Jitsu school in Los Angeles. Within this body is Scott "Einstein’s" Dark Side United moniker in Beverly Hills — a distillation of 10P's submission-only form. But what is Jiu-Jitsu?, and why is BJJ widely regarded as one of the fastest-growing sports in the world? Is it the effectiveness…or something else?
THE ECSTASY OF DEFEAT
Most of us haven't been tested very seriously in life. We've learned over time to be conflict–averse. We've become used to expressing our dissatisfaction anonymously: behind keyboards. Yet, we crave confrontation: we want to know our limits. We want an adventure.
In 2020, LA was a police state: They were arresting surfers, and closing churches. There was nothing to do but eat, and watch other people make decisions about our lives on TV. The one thing that could have saved us all — physical activity — was forbidden.
I got lucky: I was walking-distance from a 10th Planet gym. Inside I found answers — not just to the lock-down conundrum — but about myself: I wasn’t half as tough as I thought.
VIOLENCE IS THE ANSWER
Something important happens when you get beat up. Free-floating resentment burns off. Fear of physical encounters fades. You see how fragile and durable you really are. Your political sentiments get muted – your suggestibility dissipates. You regain a natural sense of scale: what you can and cannot change.
With a grown man’s shin on your chest, or his arms wrapped around your neck, the world narrows fast. You question how right you are about anything. Exhaustion takes over on a level you’ve never known: a Struggle with no end.
You can’t remember feeling more purposeful, the world feeling more real. You feel a respect for your destroyer that verges on love. Sleep comes more easily, and you wake up a little stronger, smarter, and try again. At 10P / DSU, Jiu–Jitsu really is life.
THE UNMARKETABLE
The original idea of a 10th Planet was thought up by a guy named Zechariah Sitchin, who theorized that humans were created as slaves to aliens for mining gold. These aliens are from an extra, hidden [10th] planet in our solar system called “Nibiru", which Eddie Bravo named his style of Jiu–Jitsu after. And that pretty much sets the tone for just how out-there, how truly "unmarketable", this world can be. What do you do with a brand like that?
Lack of structure is the DSU brand. Like Bravo, Eisenstein's gym is rife with conspiracy theories, sci–fi lore, Starwars Fandom, and headshop psychedelia. There were no real allegiances outside the gym, and to each other.
This jumble of cultures made for a one–of–a–kind ID task. I sought letter–forms that mimicked the grips and movements of a real fight. The result is the main DSU mark: a stable logo surrounded by a modular system of visual design, and endlessly weird permutations.
This ID challenge was very important to me: the gym wasn’t just teaching a sport – it was saving lives. And in the midst of a pandemic, I was being saved twice: in body, and in remembering why I love this industry.
WHEN THE GOING GETS TOUGH
"Struggle" is a teaser trailer for a documentary about an MMA / Jiu–Jitsu gym operating in secret during Los Angeles’ SAFER AT HOME ORDER FOR CONTROL [Closure of Non-Essential Businesses and Areas].
This project turned into a photo-journal and film about resilience — a word that was thrown around quite a lot in corporate structures during the pandemic.
What really makes us resilient? It isn't really about Jiu Jitsu — though its physicality sure helps. It's about togetherness. It's about people who risk their health to come together regardless of the pervading narrative, stay active, sharp, and interested. People who got invested, when it was never easier to cut and run — people like “S. Einstein”, who created a haven at his own risk.
Like design, Jiu–Jitsu is problem–solving in motion, and in 2020, in the heart of L.A., we were surrounded by problems on all sides, cordoned off from one another, unable to do what we do best: collaborate in the face of doom.
As rough as 10th Planet can be, I have never felt more welcome, more grounded, more mentored, or been around a more uplifting group of people anywhere: A tough gym in a tough town at a tough time in history — yet nothing could have been gentler.
I applaud people in my industry, in martial arts, and in any skilled practice who were able to translate feelings of isolation into a creative process, and come out the other side tougher, smarter, and more interested in life.
Thank you.
THANKS
Julian Ayes
Director / Photographer / Identity
Vincent Chavez, Clean & Simple Studios
Cinematographer / Editor / Sound
Scott "Einstein" Epstein
Dark Side United™ Beverly Hills Crew
Eddy Bravo / 10th Planet™
Vincent Chavez / Clean & Simple Studios™
All the fighters & students who sweat for this project.
The residents of Los Angeles who endured and continue to endure the Struggle.