Previously, Farlow was a staff photographer at The Pittsburgh Press, and The Courier-Journal and Louisville Times. While in Louisville, she was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 1976 for photographic coverage of desegregation.

Farlow worked in three African countries for Women in the Material World, a book comparing women’s roles in different cultures. She photographed in Chile, Peru and Mexico for a book on the Pan American Highway and most recently published a Geographic book titled "Wild Lands of the West".

Her images have won multiple awards in the Pictures of the Year competition and other contests. Farlow received her B.A. in Journalism from Indiana University and her master's from the University of Missouri where she also taught photojournalism.