HAL photography blog

HAL Photography is now on Facebook

2011-02-06T23:37:00.001-05:00

Check out HAL Photography on Facebook to see the latest weddings, family portraits, senior portraits, events, and our latest addition - the HAL Photography Photobooth! It's one-of-a-kind and is the latest and greatest item to add to your family events, corporate events, and weddings. Check us out here: http://www.facebook.com/HALPhotography.

Summer Lake Season - Loons

2010-08-03T10:18:00.015-04:00

Maine is a gorgeous state, especially in the summer.

Maine loons have always been a fascinating animal to me. You will see them up just chilling above the water, then they'll dive under water and show up yards away seconds later! Sometimes even with a fish in their mouths!


Maine Loon on her nest with two eggs - Summer 2010 // HALPhotography	.

It has always been a goal of mine to get a really great shot of a Maine Loon on the lake. Sounds a bit easier than it seems sometimes though! Getting out in the kayak, bringing along my zoom lens and camera, all while not letting the current push me too much while I'm getting the shots! Or of course, not flipping over with all that equipment in my possession!

Luckily, a few weeks back I was able to grab just the shot I wanted! The loon couple had created a nest and were taking turns guarding it and their two eggs waiting to hatch. The great thing about the zoom lens is that I was able to keep my distance, but yet still capture the loon without scaring it (I hope!).

Last week I was back at the lake and saw that the eggs had hatched. I saw the two parents floating around the lake teaching the baby how to swim and catch fish. It was amazing! My next goal is capturing a photo of that (though that may be a bit harder, now that they are all on the move!).

High School Senior Season Sessions are Booking!

2010-08-01T23:05:00.002-04:00

HAL Photography Senior Portrait season is up and running! I'm so excited!

Do you know a high school senior from Biddeford High School, Thornton Academy, Portland High School, Deering High School, Kennebunk High School, Massabesic High School, Old Orchard Beach High School, or even a home-schooled high school senior? Well then send them to HAL Photography to book a senior portrait session!

I love doing senior high school portraits this time of year. The summer sun in the evening is soft and just gives the right amount of light, not too hot, not too cool. Seniors are excited about their final year before heading off to the real world (whereever that may be...)!

When I was in high school, I remember not having any idea what I wanted to do with my life at the beginning of my senior year. By the end, I had a better idea, thankfully, but it's so great to remember how much of the world I had in front of me to live after I graduated.

It amazes me that my high school photo is STILL the one that my parents have up in their living room. At the time I didn't realize how much this photo would matter, but I do now! Over ten years later and my 18-year-old self is still staring back at me....I'm still thankful that I decided to wear the solid black shirt instead of the tie-dye neon shirt I thought would be the epic senior picture! Thank God for last minute decisions!

So let's create a photo that will not only look good in your parent's/grandparent's (Memere & Pepere's)/aunt & uncle's house now, but also in 20 years! Book now - email heather@halphotography.

Jump, Jump, for the weekend!

2010-05-31T21:50:00.003-04:00

Memorial Day weekend was absolutely gorgeous here on the Maine coast. The sun was shining and the storm clouds managed to stay away.

Sunday morning I was invited to hang out with this lovely family who were from Massachusetts, North Carolina, and right here in Maine. I took some more traditional shots, then we were able to have a bit of fun and make everyone laugh.....a lot. I love doing jumping photos. As you can see, the faces are priceless, and there is nothing like a happy family having a bit of fun together.

I hope the weekend went well for everyone. Summer has officially started, and this was the picture perfect weekend to ring it in!

Baby Trevor

2010-05-25T09:57:00.000-04:00

Last weekend, I was very lucky to not only photograph this little guy, but to also hang out with him for a bit. Trevor is an absolutely adorable four month old, working his way into the world by stealing the hearts of all the girls he comes into contact with. Trust me, he totally had mine within the first ten minutes!

It was a perfect spring day for the photoshoot. We were able to get outside and grab some pictures right in his backyard underneath some trees. The was a soft breeze, but thankfully, his hair maintained perfect style ;-)

Trevor has the best facial expressions, and since he was not quite ready to show me his smile, we grabbed some "natural" looking shots, which included this one, which I love, above. Thanks to Trevor and his mom for letting me grab some fun shots. I love baby photoshoots, always exciting and surprising!

A Beach Day

2010-03-24T23:09:00.010-04:00

Saturday hit a balmy 70 degrees on the coast. I fully took advantage of this fact by going for a hike on Morse Mountain in Phippsburg, Maine. The hike was a nice easy one, a good way to break in the spring season. It is a mostly tar road, with some dirt areas. Great for families, strollers, or even pulling a cooler if you'd want to.

The best part is, of course, the reason for the hike - the beach. After about two miles, the trail winds its way down to Seawall beach. A beautiful little sandy beach with rocks for climbing that sits parallel to Popham beach. When the tide is low you can walk across the beaches.

However, on our afternoon, the tide was coming up, as we soon found out when we were forced to walk through the ocean to get back to the trail entrance. Nothing like a little ice-cold Maine water to wake you from your sun-filled reverie for the hike back! Totally worth it just to have the feeling of warm sand between your feet in mid-March.

Did I mention it was snowing today? Four days later ;-)

Goodbye Winter, Hello Spring..... well in theory

2010-03-21T18:40:00.002-04:00

With winter coming to an end and spring quickly approaching, it has occurred to me how little snow we actually received this season. I think I would be lying if I said we received 30" this season.
Despite that, I was able to enjoy the wonderful snow we did get.

Of course the temps lately have gone from 60's to 40's within one week. I definitely cannot say we are in the clear for no snow for the rest of the season... but at this point, I'm ready to have warmer temps and some sunshine come our way.

Here's a little remembrance of a fun moment snowshoing in January with the family.

Beach time with the Puppies

2010-03-19T20:00:00.000-04:00

After the storm, we went for a walk on the beach with the puppies. Here are a few of my favorite photos from the walk. Of course while we were there we hit sun, rain, and yes, even snow. It's amazing how diverse Maine weather is sometimes, even within an hour!

Calm after the Storm

2010-03-17T20:50:00.000-04:00

Recently, we had a fairly substantial hurricane along the coast, with winds in the area hitting 80-90 MPH.

It was fairly surreal listening to the wind and watching the rain beat against the house and windows. A couple days later, after most people had regained power and the fallen trees had been cleaned up, I took a drive to the beach.

My goal was to photograph the puppy, however, I was quite surprised when I came across the hundreds of unearthed clams and snails from the force of the storm. I'll try to load some pictures of the puppies at the beach tomorrow.

The Lola Puppy

2010-01-14T00:09:00.006-05:00

My brother just got a new puppy. Meet Lola!

She is an Australian Shepard puppy, approximately ten weeks old I think.

She cleans up all her toys after she plays with them. She totes them all back to her bed. Its quite amusing to watch! Congrats to Eric and welcome Lola!

A trip Abroad to Istanbul

2009-11-23T20:44:00.010-05:00

Last week, I returned from a trip to Istanbul, Turkey. It was a wonderful week full of warmth, working, (co)workers, and walking.

Istanbul is a great city, I was able to take some free time and explore a bit of it.
Little trivia about Istanbul: It is the only metropolitan city that straddles two continents-Europe and Asia. We were able to take a ferry ride over to the Asian side for a night.

Very cool sky surrounding Hagia Sofia

Inside Hagia Sofia, view from the second floor

View from our hotel, great location!

Grand Bazaar

The "evil eye" memorabilia at the Grand Bazaar. The evil eye keeps away the evil spirits.

Of course there are about 1000 more pictures where this came from, but the more fun pictures, the pictures of the area, are a bit more limited. This is a small selection.

What a wonderful trip it was!

Wells Family Portrait

2009-09-14T22:35:00.004-04:00

Wells Beach is a great place for family portraits, especially on a great overcast day. The thunderstorm had just ended, leaving us with some great lighting!

This great family gathered from all over the US to come to Wells, Maine for one reason: A fabulous 80th Birthday! All the family members were able to make it for their mother/ grandmother/ great grandmother's 80th birthday celebration. It was so wonderful to have the opportunity to photograph this great event.

Happy 80th Birthday to Nancy! What a wonderful family you have created!

Steve & Raquel - Wedding Celebration

2009-08-28T17:56:00.003-04:00

On Sunday, August 9, 2009 Raquel and Steve exchanged their vows in front of family and friends on a perfect summer weekend in Maine. Their wedding celebration was held on the picturesque Peaks Island, located off the coast of Portland.

The celebration kicked off with Spanish Flamenco singers and dancers entertaining the guests as they awaited the ceremony. Even the kids enjoyed bouncing to the wonderful rhythms the singers produced! The ceremony was setup on the grass, in front of a white gazebo. The lighting was perfect, really unbelievable. No harsh sunlight in their faces, just a soft glow upon them from a warm, overcast sky.

I can't even begin to describe the amount of love you could see between Raquel and Steve on this wonderful day. Raquel had a smile that went from ear to ear, and Steve just couldn't take his eyes off her! It was so romantic (I know, it sounds cheezy, but it is true!) Just to be there to witness that kind of love was truly special.

Congratulations again to Raquel & Steve - Felicitaciones!
May you have many wonderful years ahead of you.

Middleton Family Portrait

2009-08-23T17:28:00.004-04:00

Beach Family Portraits!

Just recently, I was lucky enough to reunite with a friend whom I haven't seen in a while. She found my website and asked me to capture a family portrait and some candid shots of her and her family.

Well lucky for us, we landed a beautiful day in Biddeford Pool (aka Memere's beach to the grandkids!), and grabbed a few formal shots of everyone before letting the kids have fun in the waves.

Beach portraits are always fun to do! The family was awesome too in prepping, they all wore jeans and a white shirt, which as you can see, makes the photo really cohesive and definitely pop on the blue ocean and sky.

Thanks again for meeting up guys! What a beautiful day we had on the beach!

Miranda & Emily's Wedding Day

2009-08-22T20:34:00.007-04:00

Recently, I had the unbelievable experience of capturing Miranda & Emily's wedding day. It was absolutely beautiful. The ceremony was held at the Artist's Bridge, located in Newry, Maine (near Sunday River Ski Lodge). The reception was held outdoors at Emily's grandmother's home in a picturesque little Maine town.

Personally, I usually can reserve my emotions during ceremonies, however, this one was a bit tough. I'm not sure if it was the intimate feeling of the bridge, the tears coming down the faces of Miranda and Emily, or if it was just the absolute look of love you could see on the faces of the the two of them and so many friends and family.

Congratulations to both Emily and Miranda! May you have a wonderful life together!

Families and Beaches

2009-07-27T22:14:00.006-04:00

Welcome to Maine, the great state with a gigantic coastline! Lately, our weather has been not so "beach-friendly" for the most part. However, we are lucking out every now and then with a few days of full on real summer sun!

Lately, I was *finally* able to photograph a local family on Scarborough Beach on a beautiful sunny day. This was our third try, the first two we had planned were rained out. But like the saying goes, "third time's the charm!"

Family portraits are always great, unpredictable, exciting, and just plain fun! I was able to capture a few candid smiles on these two little ones that I'm sharing here. How cute are they?!

Special thanks to these two and their awesome mom and dad for handling the crowds on a sunny Saturday morning at the beach!

High School Senior Portrait Season

2009-07-18T13:19:00.009-04:00

It's that time again. Senior Portrait Season!
HAL Photography is having a special on High School Senior Portraits for Maine Seniors.

Receive 10% off any Senior Portrait Package when you book a session before August 15th. The session can take place after the date, you just need to book it by then. Once you choose your date, you choose your location-the beach, a local park, your backyard-we'll make it happen! Email anytime at heather@halphotography.com.

Congrats to all of the High School Seniors!

Puffins, Sunshine, and Camera Talk

2009-07-16T11:56:00.011-04:00

Vacation week, a wonderful time to realize how many tasks we've reserved for this tiny 1/52 of our year. There are many things I promised myself I would do on this vacation week. Most of them had to do with organizing closets, going through old photos, tagging my music collection, and of course enjoying any sunshine we received. Of course, none of this has to do with real vacation, its just what I tell myself I'll do when I have free time. Vacation has instead been filled with well, SUNSHINE! A rare phenomenon we haven't seen for much of the summer. I have been enjoying my vacation like a real summer vacation should be enjoyed, basking in the sunshine and daylight!

Yesterday, a friend and I went for a ride up to Boothbay Harbor to visit the Puffins. The day was unbelievably gorgeous. A nice seabreeze and sunshine made the boat ride a most enjoyable one to the island of the puffins. The puffins were not the easist of animals to photograph. They are actually quite tiny, about 10" tall. The boat could only get so close to the island, so the zoom lens and I did what we could to capture the little guys.

Technically speaking, it was quite difficult to reduce camera shake when photographing the puffins. I actually brough along my monopod, but realized the vibration from the motor would have caused more shake then hand-holding the shots with my zoom lens. I chose to increase the shutter speed to 4000 (the highest normal level on my Nikon), and because I still wanted a good depth of field, kept the aperture between 2.8 and 4. This may have hindered me, however, focusing on the puffins as they flew around or swam on a rocking boat was a fun challenge! The shutter speed was needed, but I think having the aperture a bit narrower would have saved a few shots where the focus was on the wave in front or behind the bird. My saving grace was putting the shutter on continuous mode. This allowed me to follow the bird as it set flight from the water.

There are actually a series of about eight photos from above. The three above captured it best. I'll try to put up the entire series of swimming to flight if you are interested.

Today is an overcast day with a bit of sunshine peaking out every now and then. Perfect day for getting to a few of those "needed" vacation items like laundry and dishes ;-) And of course, a wonderful day for a run.

Fourth of July

2009-07-14T15:13:00.013-04:00

Vacation is a wonderful thing, finally I'm getting the chance to upload the photos from the last couple of weeks.

Independence Day. A time to bring family together up at camp.

Maine has had an unusual amount of rain lately. Actually, as I'm writing this it is raining again out. On Saturday, the fourth, it started out sunny, then unfortunately we had a few thunderstorms. However, they passed by and we were able to enjoy the day, despite the temperature drop of about 15 degrees :)

Later that night, the fireworks were still on! We took out the boat and enjoyed the show from the lake. However, even better then the fireworks was this full moon shining on the lake. It's a bit soft, but what a gorgeous night it was!

Marley Anthony!

2009-06-29T18:04:00.016-04:00

Welcome to the world Marley Anthony!

Yesterday morning I was incredibly lucky to have the opportunity to photograph a very special baby boy. This was by no means a professional shoot, instead it was my first introduction to my new cousin, which I just happened to have a camera for!

Marley Anthony was born June 11, 2009, and is absolutely adorable! He is two and a half weeks old and just a tiny little thing, barely six pounds! He was supposed to be born July 1, so his tiny size is definitely expected :-)

It was a very rainy Sunday morning as I pulled up to their place. Despite this, the lighting was still good and I was able to grab a few photos of him with his eyes open! He is becoming more and more alert as the days progress.

The photo to the left above shows the incredible size difference between Marley's itty bitty fingers and his dad's (seemingly) big ones.

His feet look so small in his mother's hands. He was so peaceful and content.....for a bit :)

He looks so tiny in his dad's hands, doesn't he?
Unfortunately though, he was not in the best of moods that morning. I blame it on the rain, its practically been raining everyday since he was born! Poor thing! Though I must say, even his unhappy faces were still beautiful.

Finally, as I was leaving he allowed us to put him down in something other then the arms of his parents. Looks like he's trying to grab his toes while sleeping, doesn't it? You've got to wonder what he's dreaming about.

Welcome to the world Marley Anthony, and congratulations to your parents, grandparents, friends, and family. And especially to your very excited new Uncle Micah!

Hopefully we'll get a chance to get together again soon when he's feeling a bit more up to it, and the sun is shining of course!

A photographic taste of vegas

2009-06-26T22:28:00.002-04:00

Recently, I posted about my trip to Vegas. I've gone through the photos and wanted to share a few from my trip to the "Fabulous Las Vegas!"

I started out by mentioning my flight across the midwest. I was lucky enough to not only have a window seat, but also fly during the day, instead of the red-eye flights I usually take.

The Colorado Rocky Mountains were unbelievable. In a vast desert, surrounded by squares of corn fields and crop circles, stood this snow-capped unending vertical trail of mountains. It was odd in a way, because I knew how warm the weather must be down there in the middle of June, and yet, there was the snow.

Not too long after that (well in airplane time that is), I flew over the wonder that is the Grand Canyon. The maze of outlets, and the array of little streams that all encompass the Colorado River was awesome.

We explored quite a bit of the "strip," and ended up visiting the Paris Resort one evening.

While we were visiting, a trip to the top of the "Eiffel Tower of Vegas" seemed appropriate.

A view of the Bellagio Resort from atop the Eiffel Tower.

Las Vegas definitely does not hold anything back when it comes to lights. Even at midnight it was like walking around during late afternoon. Of course, this just means a fabulous skyline and view.

We also had a chance to visit the Hoover Dam, check out many different lobbies of many hotels, catch the Cirque du Soleil show "O," and even absorb a bit of vitamin d for an hour or so. It had been raining before we left, and we saw looking at the forecast it would be raining for days after we returned. Having almost a week of sunshine and even 99 degrees plus was worth it!

Here's to a most fabulous week in the one-and-only Vegas! And thanks to my two friends for joining me for the lovely break-from-reality.

Las Vegas and the many terrains of America

2009-06-20T00:41:00.006-04:00

Today I flew from Maine to fabulous Las Vegas, Nevada. It is quite exciting to be here, but for the first time in a while, I actually enjoyed the flight. Granted we were delayed in Chicago for three hours due to lightening storms, but overall it was worth it.

It has been a while since I've taken a long flight during the day, and on a clear day without much cloud cover for that matter. Because of this, during the flight, I was able to take the time to look out the window and see the world we were flying over.

The result was magnificent.

We flew over an array of "crop circles," which no, were not made by aliens, though the geometric way they are created could be considered other-worldly. We then were above a wonderful mountain range, which I think may have been the Rockies. Following the snow-capped mountains, an incredible red world of etched out earth was beheld. We had just flown over the Grand Canyon! I've never actually had the chance to set foot on it, but peering at it from 1000+ miles up has convinced me this is one trip I need to take. As we crossed further into Arizona the canyons and rock formations in the distance came into view. It was magnificent.

The valleys fillled with small towns, surrounded by mountainous earth, were almost reminscent of a movie. One road connecting five little clusters of houses and land. It was all so surreal. It's amazing how living in such a forest-filled part of the US doesn't allow you to actually see what is down below its shady cover. Flying over the midwest, I noticed trees and forest-filled areas were hard to come by; instead, you can see everything in its beauty, nothing hiding or protecting the naked earth before you.

I did indeed have my little Fugi point and shoot with me on the flight. For all above items mentioned, photographs will be forthcoming. This is a photo blog after all! At this point, all I can do is hope your imaginations will fill in the blanks until I return home and upload my photos.

Welcome Welcome

2009-06-15T21:13:00.003-04:00

Welcome!

HAL Photography blog is the most dynamic part of my website halphotography.com.
I actually created this blog last year, but have finally made it public recently!

In here, you'll find a little bit of my life, usually surrounded by a few photographs. Hopefully this blog will allow me to share a bit of my professional photography, and a bit of my not so professional fun-photography.

We'll see where it takes us, shall we? Hopefully at some point I'll be able to cover some how-to's and basic elements of photography. I'll try my best to add little bits of here and there. Feel free to join me if you'd like!