The cinematography...

You should see one of Dunham's early shorts, Pressure.

Technically atrocious.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRZhZiA5q9o

ABSOLUTELY DISAGREE!!! I'm 10 minutes into this movie and I'm thinking the opposite. It is not the normal, shaky cam, look at my depth of field in and out of focus crap work that I'm used to seeing in independent productions shot with DSLR. I like the fact that the story, writing and acting, whether you like it or not, is the centerpiece and not the irritating cinematography that seems to be taking over young filmmakers minds these days. Are you watching the same film I am? And for the comments below about lighting, i say congrats to the filmmakers for making a film that I can watch without wanting to turn up the brightness on my TV. Again, another failure of young filmmakers, heck even old filmmakers, is making a picture that's too dark, in a film that doesn't call for it. I'm all for atmosphere when needed, but not every film needs to look like noir. A simple comedy/drama about everyday life can be nice and bright and let the story do the work. i am quite impressed with the look of this movie for the fact that it doesn't get in the way, when too many low budget films are unwatchable, due to the obnoxious camera work.

I just watched This Film and the Cinematography is just Fine it Looked pretty Good to me nothing stylistic or movement or lighting wise to make you say wow but the Kind of film it is, it doesn't need to be I thought it was very Classy & simple and the scenes looked like they were blocked out enough . you're entitled to your opinion But I just don't think its as bad as you're as some of you are painting it to be .

I think you're WAY off on this one. What really distinguishes this film from typical mumblecore films is that it is so well composed. There are aspects one could criticize about TF but composition is not one of them. In fact, you should listen to Paul Schrader (no slouch himself) talking about the exceptional visuals in this film on the Criterion DVD. I tend to agree. Look at the symmetry, the use of depth, the excellent use of anamorphic. I teach at a film school and I can tell you that a lot of people think the widescreen format is just a gimmick to give a film a more "professional" look. Dunham uses the aspect ratio very effectively and pays great attention to what is in the frame.

I can totally respect people not enjoying TF, but two elements that can't be denied are Lena Dunham's gift for dialogue and her skill (along with her cinematographer) for composition.

STWIKE HIM CENTUWIAN, VERY WUFFLY!

In this article The DP talked about his choice of camera and how he did the lighting. He didn't sound happy with the 7D at all.

http://www.creativeplanetnetwork.com/videography/features/tiny-budget- 39tiny-furniture39-big-ideas/20854

After graduating from Oberlin College, an awkward, self-conscious young woman named Aura returns to her wealthy mother's sprawling New York apartment to try to come to terms with the breakup of her college relationship, her confusion about men in general and the terrifying possibility of not achieving immediate wealth and success. Her mother, a famous photographer of scale-model furniture, and her younger sister, who exceeds all of Aura's high school successes, go about their lives with apparently no sympathy for Aura's plight.

Whether writer/director/star Lena Dunham, also a recent Oberlin graduate, designed Tiny Furniture to be autobiographical is not clear, although the mother, the sister and the massive white apartment really are Dunham's mother, her sister and the lower Manhattan apartment they inhabit. Made on a very small budget (nobody would commit to real numbers, but the filmmakers used the terms "micro" and "miniscule" a lot), Tiny Furniture follows Aura around as she interacts with eccentric friends, egotistical boys and unsympathetic family members.

Dunham brought cinematographer Jody Lee Lipes to shoot. The two had met at the 2009 SXSW Film Festival, when her 60-minute film Creative Nonfiction and his work (as director), NY Export: Opus Jazz, were screened.

Lipes had hoped to not have to use a DSLR to shoot Dunham's film, preferring the RED or one of the Panasonic HVX cameras with a 35mm lens adapter, but he ultimately went with a Canon EOS 7D to accommodate the script's requirement of some night exteriors and the fact that his lighting package was almost non-existent.

He had an open-faced 2K tungsten unit and some Kino Flos, but nothing that would make much difference for walk-and-talks along the New York streets at night. Although he realized that dialing the ISO way up to 1600 for some scenes would result in rather flat, gritty images, there was really no better option for those conditions. Meanwhile, at ISO settings like 50, which he used for day exteriors, and 200 for interiors where he could bounce his few lights around the very white walls of the apartment location, the images held up well even on a theater screen.

Lipes presented Dunham with his reluctant decision to shoot with the 7D and she agreed. "My tech brain isn't always screwed on," she says. "Jody told me it could work, so I believed him even though it looked ridiculously small to me. It was particularly nice because it allowed us to shoot places we weren't necessarily permitted for."

As with most people who shoot with the Canon cameras, Lipes' primary issues had to do with ergonomics and the lenses, which are designed for still photographers to auto focus rather than for filmmakers to manually control. He used a Redrock shoulder mount, which he says was helpful, but he considered the accessory gears designed to help follow focus "an unnecessary layer of crap." Likewise, he made very little use of external monitors or magnifiers, preferring instead to make the best of the camera's LCD as-is. He and Dunham both sing the praises of first assistant Joe Anderson for being able to pull focus extremely well with equipment that was not designed for it. "It was like watching a great musician play an instrument," Dunham says.

Lipes considers the HDSLR camera "a thorn in my side" because "it's become the go-to camera for any very low-budget project, and the images have a noticeable kind of feel that is no longer aesthetically pleasing to me." He admits that the cameras may well have allowed some projects to come into existence that might not have otherwise, but that doesn't excuse the smearing and artifacting and all the rest to his cinematographer's eye.

He did make a point of praising the highlight protection function. "That's really the most special thing about the camera," Lipes says. "It gave us more information in the highlights than I would have ever expected. It's nothing like film, of course, but for a camera this size and this price, that was pretty impressive."

As for Aura's alter ego, Lena, she might not have to worry too long, at least about her professional life. Based in part on Tiny Furniture, she is already in business with HBO and Judd Apatow