Wild grizzly bear, Glacier National Park

[MichaelHodges]

There are 1200 of these in the lower 48:



http://michaelhodgesfiction.com/

[brad-man]

That is an awesome shot! I hope you were using really long glass

[Krob78]

There are 1200 of these in the lower 48:



http://michaelhodgesfiction.com/

Sad to think that there are only 1200 in the lower 48...    Your image is excellent Mike, really shows how incredibly beautiful their coats are and how massive these bears are... Great Shot, Congrats!

[kubelik]

sweet shot.  curious to know what lens, and other details of the shot - were you hiking backcountry?

[Greatland]

Hey, tell us a little about the equipment used to take the picture....please?

[Jackson_Bill]

Definitely a great shot. Nice light and the claws show very well

[Jackson_Bill]

7D, 500mm f/4 L

[westr70]

Nice shot.  Terribly jealous.............. of the lens.   I've put off buying one of these (used) because of the cost and depth of field issues that I've heard about.  Any opinions you'd care to share?

[Jackson_Bill]

Nice shot.  Terribly jealous.............. of the lens.   I've put off buying one of these (used) because of the cost and depth of field issues that I've heard about.  Any opinions you'd care to share?

I'm not sure if you're asking me or Mike but here are my thoughts:
Overall, I'm happy with my 500mm (IS, older version) and I'm glad I bought it.  Time and time again I've been impressed with the sharpness of that lens. Yes, if you're relatively close the DOF is very shallow but that's the nature of the beast, I think. The negatives are the AF is slow and it has a tendency to hunt. And, it is heavy.

[MichaelHodges]

Hey, tell us a little about the equipment used to take the picture....please?

Hey everyone, thanks for the kind words.

The photo was taken with a Canon 7D and a 300 F4 L IS + Canon 1.4x II TC. Here are some stats:

spot metering
iso 400
420mm
1/800
F10
AI Servo + AF expansion center cluster
+5 micro focus adjust

I agree that the key is to get the claws nice and sharp in the image. I was pleased with the image out of camera (bears are elusive, so this is a rare thing). Very little processing was applied.



http://michaelhodgesfiction.com/

[chops411]

Great picture.

[ions]

Very nice! There appears to be another bear behind him, did you get a shot of that one too?

[MichaelHodges]

Good eyes

More photos forthcoming, with mom and mystery bear in the cliffs (but first, I need to actually process those images, lol).




http://michaelhodgesfiction.com/

[serendipidy]

ions....good eye indeed!

I missed that until you pointed it out. Even then, I could bearly see it

[bycostello]

lovely image...