Caitlyn Smith, Blackbelt Grading (PEOPLE 2024)

Japanese Jujitsu is a passion of mine, which I have an amazing opportunity to photograph others milestones. These photographs show the hard work that my peers have to getting a huge achievement by getting their black-belt. Twice a year red-belts and black-belts join together over a two day grading to show their dedication, strength and resilience to achieve their next belt. During the gradings participants show; strength through breaking 2-4cm thick boards in different ways, dedication by perfecting their technique before the grading, and resilience by being thrown to the ground 100 times and always getting back up, or showing resilience by doing multiple rounds of sparring with no break in-between.

Images have been resized for web display, which may cause some loss of image quality. Note: Original high-resolution images are used for judging.