Caroline Martucci and Clara Peters: We have grown closer and found success by embracing our own photography styles

It’s rare to find one of us without the other. 

Simultaneous nail appointments before every school dance, working the same seven-hour shifts at Kansas City Country Club three days a week every summer and a joint grad party — all thanks to four years on Harbinger together.

We became friends through shared carpools to gallery shoots — before we were trusted to drive on the highway — and sitting on the J-room floor freshman year because there weren’t enough chairs for new staffers. We were those “bungee buddies” Tate begged to split up on the field so we didn’t end up with SD cards full of identical pictures.

It wasn’t until our first Dallas summer workshop that our bungee cord snapped.

After an hour-long sweaty bus ride for our intermediate photo class, we started our assignment: photographing a waterpark. The blinding Texas sun made it impossible to see the pictures we’d taken. 

Realizing neither of us took any usable photos, we knew we had to switch locations. That’s when something unprecedented happened.

We wanted to shoot different scenes at the waterpark.

We wouldn’t have time to shoot two different activities so we made a choice we hadn’t before: to split up. Yes, we actually had to adjust our settings without asking each other what ISO to use. But after working our own scenes, the photos turned out great despite shooting alone. We each received awards at the end of the workshop, but for different reasons. 

Ever since that day, we’ve had enough confidence in our own skills to divide and conquer. In Dallas the following year, we naturally split off to shoot different photostories — don’t worry, we shared a cheese pizza for lunch first.

And now as Head Print Photo Editors, we know the importance of teaching our 30-person photography staff the power of their individual perspectives.

Our goal with this year’s photo magazine was to share stories through each photographer’s lens and perspective.

When the magazine placed fourth at a national convention — the highest the Harbinger has placed since we started producing photo magazines — it proved success can come from seeing life through different lenses. The same shoot will now always result in different photos from us. If you show Tate a photo from an event we both shot, he immediately knows which one of us took it. 

So, don’t be afraid to stretch your bungee cord. Finding success on your own doesn’t mean your cord can’t snap back together to write your senior column.

Or maybe that’s just us.