Half-frame FM2 listed on ebay

Never knew these were even made:

Nikom FM2 Half Frame Camera Very RARE Item in Nice Condition Only 39 Made | eBay

I wonder why they even wanted half frames like that.

jdeg said:

I wonder why they even wanted half frames like that.

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For mug shots? And half-frame images would cut your film/processing costs in half.

480sparky said:

For mug shots? And half-frame images would cut your film/processing costs in half.

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I didn't think of mug shots. I'm assuming all pictures would've been processed in house so that makes sense too.

Mug shots could make sense, since half frame would be portrait orientation already, and would get twice as many shots on a roll.

But it seems like false economy compared to designing a special and very limited production camera just for that job.

35mm movie cameras were half frame too (very slightly smaller to have room for audio track), but they ran the film up and down anyway.

I know that a common classroom medium form used back in the 1970s was a “filmstrip”, which usually consisted of a long strip of 35mm film bearing half-frame pictures, and an accompanying audio cassette tape containing a narration for the pictures, and a beep to tell you when to advance to the next picture. I don't think I've ever seen such a thing, but I would imagine that there was probably a specialized type of half-frame 35mm camera used to produce these filmstrips, wherein the film would run vertically. Sort of like a movie camera, but not quite.

Yashica made a half frame camera and I sold many of them. All my labs were set up to process and print them. They were surprisingly good.