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I finished what I thought was a 36 exposure roll of film earlier, but once I got it out of the camera I realised it was only a 24. I am using an old Ricoh XR2 camera which has manual film advance so it didn't automatically wind back; it also didn't protest when I wound it past 24.
The film seemed to wind back into the canister without a problem. Will the film be damaged or ruined in any way, or will the last frame just be massively overexposed from having 12 shots exposed on it?
For most film camera shutters, the mechanism does not 'cock' until the film advances. If the film does not advance then the shutter is not able to release. Unless your camera broke the sprocket holes on the film and simply advanced without moving the film, I suspect you got lucky and found your 24 roll was significantly more than 24 frames.
It really depends on the camera (and I don't know how the XR2 works).
Many of the later-model (mid-'70s and beyond) consumer-oriented cameras had a slip clutch on the winder mechanism to deal with those instances where the user "knew" that their cartridge had more exposures than the camera said there were. There was usually a little bit of extra force required to overcome it, but allowing the slip made more sense than either letting the winder mechanism self-destruct or chewing up the sprockets to the point where rewinding the film might become impossible. (Cameras that were designed to accept a motor drive or winder usually didn't have a slip clutch; they relied on the degree of force required with a fixed mechanism to stop the winder/drive.)
If that is the case, you'll likely have twenty-five or twenty-six clean exposures and one frame with multiple exposures (probably out of register). As for damage to the camera, the next roll of film will tell—if this "safety valve" has been used often enough over the life of the camera, there may be little to tell in terms of the winding force, but as long as the mechanism can advance the film eight sprocket holes before enabling the shutter release (even if that takes more than one full pump of the winding lever), you should be okay.
I'm not familiar with that model, You probably either have multiple exposures on the last frame or a broken reel.
Mind you, it's usually possible to get an extra couple of shots on a typical reel by not winding it on any further than absolutely necessary when you load it.
Ahhh, the days of film, were every frame was precious.
Excuse me, I'm going for a short reminisce. I may be some time...
Late answer, but for posterity I post.
As you already say in the comment above this anwer: it is probably a case of not loading the film properly, the film leader slipped off the take-up spool and every exposure was made on the same part of the film (basically on the leader)
The good part: if you can extract the film-leader again (there are pretty cheap tools for this) you can actually use the film again. I would make sure to skip the first 1 or 2 frames, just in case though.
