"I shoot a tiger in my pajamas...

**theantiquetiger** · 08-15-2013, 12:25 PM

...how he got in my pajamas is beyond me!"

This is LSU's live tiger mascot, Mike the Tiger. He lives on campus, in a $3,000,000 habitat. He is tough to shoot because you are either shooting through glass or two layers of fence. I shot 30+ shots of him today as he walked around the habitat, but nothing was coming out good. Finally he got tired and laid down in an opening between bushes. I walked to the opening and found myself five feet (less than 2 meters) from his head. He turned and looked directly at me. This was through fence but luckily, both of his eyes fell between the wires of the fence. I just had to clone out the fence across his nose. If you look closely, you will find flaws in the cloning.

This image is about 98% full frame. All I did was level his eyes, causing just a tad cropping on the edges.

mike the tiger1 by Theantiquetiger, on Flickr

**JAS_Photo** · 08-15-2013, 01:51 PM

Cool! It is tough to get good photos of animals in captivity due to all things you mentioned above.

**Mad Aussie** · 08-15-2013, 04:18 PM

Aren't they amazing animals to see up close like that. I took photos of one in similar conditions myself a few years back. Tell me AT ... did you feel like 'prey'? When he locked in on me and just stared at me ... that's what I felt like!

**theantiquetiger** · 08-15-2013, 04:31 PM

Originally Posted by Mad Aussie

Aren't they amazing animals to see up close like that. I took photos of one in similar conditions myself a few years back. Tell me AT ... did you feel like 'prey'? When he locked in on me and just stared at me ... that's what I felt like!

He is kind of a gentle giant, born and raised in captivity. He probably gets more visitors daily than any other tiger in a zoo. I wouldn't want to locked in his habitat, of course.

BTW, it's already printed and framed