Benjamin Apple

I direct web videos, perform improv comedy, take photos, make audio recordings, and build websites.

I'm wearing a wig in this photo.

Wed Jul 28
Tue Jul 27
zuleyka:

This starts tonight at 7:30. Schedule at: http://newyork.ucbtheatre.com/shows/1138

zuleyka:

This starts tonight at 7:30. Schedule at: http://newyork.ucbtheatre.com/shows/1138

Thu Jul 22

Small but big personal accomplishment

Couple months ago I changed stuff on ImprovTeams.com. One of the things I did was some search engine optimization (SEO), i.e. trying to make it so I show up higher in search results. It’s hard. There’s, like, a whole industry dedicated to it.

Long story short, ImprovTeams.com is now on the first page of results when you Google New York improv. With UCB, Magnet, PIT, Improv Everywhere, etc! I’ve been watching it slowly climb up from page 7 to page whatever to the middle of page 2. Fiiiiinally it’s on the first page*. Also, the site’s getting over 1,000 hits per weekday. If it was 1998 and the internet bubble hadn’t burst, I could make money with that kind of traffic. These days you need 100x that or so.

As a long-time computer nerd and web programmer, I’m really proud of the site’s search engine ranking! For a lot of improv teams and even people, if you Google them you’ll find their ImprovTeams page above their Facebook page. If you don’t believe me, Google Shaun Diston. Kapow.

It’s not just due to my mmmmmm-pressive SEO work, it’s mainly because people actually link to their team pages and performer profiles, which makes me way, way happier. I love when people use and enjoy web stuff I made. Like chefs dig it when people dig their food.

Later

*Rankings actually tend to bounce up and down a little, so whenever you’re reading this the site could be at the top of the second page or something. Oh well.

Wed Jul 21
Couple months ago I wrote a little web app that uses some (pretty inaccurate) physics modeling to cause colored spheres to gravitate towards/around each other, leaving paths behind them. I liked the results.

Couple months ago I wrote a little web app that uses some (pretty inaccurate) physics modeling to cause colored spheres to gravitate towards/around each other, leaving paths behind them. I liked the results.

Sun Jul 11
At high frequencies, a building’s power wiring behaves like a system of misterminated transmission lines gone berserk, reflecting RF energy back and forth throughout the power wiring until it is eventually absorbed or radiated.
- Reading up on RF interference to learn how to handle its audio-recording implications, but that sentence is cool and scary in general.
Fri Jul 9

This Monday I’m auditioning to play Steve Jobs in a TV commercial. If I end up getting the part, my nerd life will have come full circle in the weirdest way possible.

First Benjonica show in weeks or months, can’t wait! Sunday at 8.
chamberlain:

Check out this fistful of free show on Sunday! 
beniceyouguys:

It’s Summertime, and the living is easy- so long as “easy” means draping  cold washcloths on your body in order get any sleep at night. Why not  take a night off from the joys of sweat and shack up in the cool company of  Brooklyn’s best FREE comedy show?Nice!, the nicest comedy show  ever is proud to present the COOLEST edition ever of our monthly show  this Sunday, July 11th at 8pm @ Legion Bar! THIS MONTH’S INSANELY COOL  LINEUP:*MOLLY KNEFEL! (You know her from The Onion and The  Huffington Post, and can catch her doing great comedy all summer @ Le  Poisson Rouge!) *JENN SCHATZ! (You know her from the film  Splinterheads, and can catch her this summer in Adam McKay’s The Other  Guys!)*BENJONICA! (You know Benjamin Apple & Verónica Osorio from Late Night Interview and the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, and  can catch Verónica this summer in the historical epic Taita Boves!)*NATE  KUSHNER! (You know him from A Week of Kindness and Movies vs. Humans,  and can catch his new band Igloos on tour this summer!)…with your  hosts, the most cold-hearted comedians in New York, Dan Chamberlain  & Halle Kiefer!That’s an insanely cool lineup in an insanely  well-air conditioned venue, all for FREE! And friends of Nice! know it  wouldn’t be cool to forgo our regular SUPER SECRET* FUN GIVE-A-WAYs, so  you can count on that too! Come on out on SUNDAY THE 11TH for  the best FREE AIR CONDITIONED show FREE that has FREE FREE AIR  CONDITIONED FREE ever turned on a jukebox by punching it. NOW THAT’S COOL.(*This will probably be ice cream sandwiches. But we’ll  see.)

First Benjonica show in weeks or months, can’t wait! Sunday at 8.

chamberlain:

Check out this fistful of free show on Sunday!

beniceyouguys:

It’s Summertime, and the living is easy- so long as “easy” means draping cold washcloths on your body in order get any sleep at night. Why not take a night off from the joys of sweat and shack up in the cool company of Brooklyn’s best FREE comedy show?

Nice!, the nicest comedy show ever is proud to present the COOLEST edition ever of our monthly show this Sunday, July 11th at 8pm @ Legion Bar! THIS MONTH’S INSANELY COOL LINEUP:

*MOLLY KNEFEL! (You know her from The Onion and The Huffington Post, and can catch her doing great comedy all summer @ Le Poisson Rouge!)

*JENN SCHATZ! (You know her from the film Splinterheads, and can catch her this summer in Adam McKay’s The Other Guys!)

*BENJONICA! (You know Benjamin Apple & Verónica Osorio from Late Night Interview and the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre, and can catch Verónica this summer in the historical epic Taita Boves!)

*NATE KUSHNER! (You know him from A Week of Kindness and Movies vs. Humans, and can catch his new band Igloos on tour this summer!)

…with your hosts, the most cold-hearted comedians in New York, Dan Chamberlain & Halle Kiefer!

That’s an insanely cool lineup in an insanely well-air conditioned venue, all for FREE! And friends of Nice! know it wouldn’t be cool to forgo our regular SUPER SECRET* FUN GIVE-A-WAYs, so you can count on that too!

Come on out on SUNDAY THE 11TH for the best FREE AIR CONDITIONED show FREE that has FREE FREE AIR CONDITIONED FREE ever turned on a jukebox by punching it. NOW THAT’S COOL.

(*This will probably be ice cream sandwiches. But we’ll see.)

Mon Jul 5
Sun Jul 4

Advice

I wish when I was younger someone had said to me:

Everyone’s advice is based on their own interpretations of their successes and failures, which are produced by luck and chance just as much as methods and intentions. Take advice about how to do X with a grain of salt when it’s coming from someone who has only done X once and is still riding the wave of that success. They think they know how they did it, but they probably don’t. On the other hand if someone does X constantly, listen to everything they say, figure out why it’s true, and imitate or adapt it.

Wed Jun 30

Important Things

Today I entered my first ever festival of any kind! I did an extensive re-edit of Rob Stern’s Late Night Interview episode and submitted it to the New York Television Festival’s Independent Pilot Competition. Submissions are due by midnight tonight, and hand-delivery is allowed, so Vero and I dropped it off on 19th street around 7 p.m. The woman who took it was super nice for someone who’s probably really busy right now, and that put us in a great mood.

In addition to re-editing the episode I made a trailer, did some “artist commentary” on behind-the-scenes footage, assembled a press packet with pilot/series/production details, and touched up a couple of still frames for inclusion.

I started working on my submission weeks ago, but as usual I left most of it to the last minute and have spent the last 72 hours losing my mind as I dealt with Final Cut errors, a painfully slow laptop, nerve-wracking editing decisions, and a lot of sleep deprivation. This person:

helped me with every part of the process, including the parts where I was so tired and miserable that I literally cried like a baby at the slightest provocation. Her notes on the written parts of my packet were invaluable and she gave me a hard-but-great note on the trailer which required me to re-edit and re-render pretty late into the process, but which I’m now super glad I took. She was even the one who read over the submission rules carefully enough to discover that I could deliver it by hand, which gave me another 36 hours or so to work on everything.

Also, this week we’ve been together for nine months, which means that if this relationship was a fetus, it would be ready to come out and party and stuff.

Fri Jun 25
Thao/Mirah show last night. Great music, nice crowd.

Thao/Mirah show last night. Great music, nice crowd.

The World’s Reaction to Landon Donovan’s Game Winning Goal

A Ridiculously Specific Question

I’ve observed that fans are the only thing in the world that go Off, High, Medium, Low instead off Off, Low, Medium, High.

How do I turn this into an Observational Comedy Stand-Up Joke?

Seriously.

Wed Jun 23
Sun Jun 20
Dad and Mom a year before I was born.
When I was a baby Dad grew his beard out and hasn’t shaved it since. So this is literally one of the most recent photos of my dad’s bare face.

Dad and Mom a year before I was born.

When I was a baby Dad grew his beard out and hasn’t shaved it since. So this is literally one of the most recent photos of my dad’s bare face.