My bet is that the camera has a roll of rolled up backing paper only on the spool
Could it be a 120 half roll?
It has not been cut, has the loading tapered tongue. I’m pretty sure the first two replies are correct. I’ll take it into the darkroom tomorrow and find out.
In Japan, they apparently sold half length 120 rolls, because the "Texas Leica" Fuji rangefinders for 120 film offered a frame counter setting for them.
I saw a big listing of half length 120 Portra on eBay once, they were selling like 100 rolls of it for a high price.
These Fuji cameras were used a lot to take pictures of big tourist groups so it makes sense that they wouldn't want many pictures before a development.
@MattKing all of the GW series cameras I've owned have had a provision for the 120 half roll.
The backing paper or sealing band will tell you what format it is. They made the difference very obvious so photographers and lab technicians could tell them apart at a glance. If it’s Ilford paper, there will be a black/white diagonal stripe pattern on the top and bottom edge, and the film name will have “220” beneath it. If it’s Kodak, there will either be “220” in big letters with horizontal lines between each repetition, or green cross-hatching along the entire width of the film with the film name being accompanied by “220”. I have yet to get my hands on any Fuji 220 paper but I suspect that it will also be marked distinctly
Not surprising.
But I'm not sure I've seen cameras other than the Fuji ones.
Not surprisingly, this reflects backing paper/leaders and tails from when 220 was widely available.
I don't know whether there was any 220 backing paper made after Kodak and Harman/Ilford stopped printing/having printed the film identifying information on 120 backing paper. If they had continued with 220, I expect the leaders and trailers would have also lost that information.
But I'm not sure I've seen cameras other than the Fuji ones.
Fuji being the only manufacturer of cameras that have a 1/2 120 roll setting while also being probably the only manufacturer of 1/2 120 rolls of film? Sounds sensible.
I believe Shanghai prints new 220 paper, and it has similar markings to Kodak, although without the film name.
The reason for not having the film name printed on the backing paper is that the backing paper manufacturers/printers have large minimum order requirements, and the bigger film manufacturers can't afford to tie up loads of capital in several years of backing paper inventory by ordering separate product for each film.
Instead, they use the same paper for all films, and put different, film specific sealing strips on each end of the film.
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