Mindsurfing with SPIKE MORRIS

SPIKE MORRIS is a Director of Photography and Editor working freelance in the world of music videos. Fascinated by inspiration and the creative process, recent collaborations with David Terranova have led him to work with Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs. Spike is currently editing ‘VETO’, a half hour self-produced documentary on Palestine’s UN bid for statehood. You can keep up with Spike and check out his work HERE & HERE

WHAT WAS YOUR VERY FIRST SOURCE OF INSPIRATION?

Perhaps not my first inspiration, but last year I stumbled across a copy of ‘It’s Not How Good You Are, It’s How Good You Want To Be’. A couple of months after I quit university to work as a freelancer, I had an idea of what I wanted to do but my nervousness was holding me back. Paul Arden’s pocket sized book suggests that ambition is the most important thing required to get finally doing what you love, and reading it at the time felt like exactly what I had been searching for.

It opens with lines like ‘If you mark the goalposts then it’s easy to score’ and sounds like a tedious self-help book but it’s far from it. It really clicked with me and turned everything on it’s head, making me realise that the world was so much more accessible than I imagined. There’s a great quote from Steve Jobs on the subject too.

WHICH OF YOUR 5 SENSES IS THE MOST IMPORTANT TO YOU?

Sight! It’s gorgeous. Like most people I have a visual memory also, which is fun.

HOW DO YOU ACCESS YOUR CREATIVITY?

I forget about the clock. Hours and minutes are units invented by humankind to make sense of time, and they’re not always appropriate. If you’re working late one night and it’s going well, don’t beat yourself up about the time, just immerse yourself with what’s in-front of you and sleep in the next day. Whatever works.

I also think it’s crucial to stay positive, find enjoyment in the work you do, and be prolific. All creatives should leave a trail behind them of projects that they threw themselves into. Regardless of how good they were or whether they’re published or not. I find it enormously rewarding to create something and put it on the shelf, as it were. Too many people worry about not being good enough, and give up if something’s not perfect. “Lets work at being better at what we do by f***ing up faster, not less. Lets make better mistakes tomorrow.”

WHAT IS THE FIRST WORD THAT COMES TO YOUR MIND WHEN YOU LOOK AT THIS IMAGE?