diff --git a/imageio/imageio-tiff/src/main/java/com/twelvemonkeys/imageio/plugins/tiff/TIFFImageWriter.java b/imageio/imageio-tiff/src/main/java/com/twelvemonkeys/imageio/plugins/tiff/TIFFImageWriter.java
index 3ab899bd..ab3c3d1d 100644
--- a/imageio/imageio-tiff/src/main/java/com/twelvemonkeys/imageio/plugins/tiff/TIFFImageWriter.java
+++ b/imageio/imageio-tiff/src/main/java/com/twelvemonkeys/imageio/plugins/tiff/TIFFImageWriter.java
@@ -955,11 +955,15 @@ public final class TIFFImageWriter extends ImageWriterBase {
         configureStreamByteOrder(streamMetadata, imageOutput);
 
         writingSequence = true;
-        sequenceTIFFWriter = new TIFFWriter("bigtiff".equalsIgnoreCase(getFormatName()) ? 8 : 4);
+        sequenceTIFFWriter = new TIFFWriter(isBigTIFF() ? 8 : 4);
         sequenceTIFFWriter.writeTIFFHeader(imageOutput);
         sequenceLastIFDPos = imageOutput.getStreamPosition();
     }
 
+    private boolean isBigTIFF() throws IOException {
+        return "bigtiff".equalsIgnoreCase(getFormatName());
+    }
+
     @Override
     public void writeToSequence(final IIOImage image, final ImageWriteParam param) throws IOException {
         if (!writingSequence) {