It would be great to see a nice, sharp image of the flat surface of each bead in order to judge how they were made.

Rosanna, thank you for responding to my message. This is not my strand so I don't have any better photos. But the fact that you are asking for better photos suggests to me that there could be a question as to whether these are "cut down" versions of French Ambassador beads or original half beads. These look cut down to me.

on the black one at the top of the picture, it seems that the applied dots wrap around the edge a bit. That would only be possible if the bead was decorated after it was made in the present shape. But, it may be an optical illusion since the focus is bad.

That's a good point. I did find another photo of the strand, does this help?

somewhere around here I have an ambassador with an equatorial break, I think that is what you're looking at with the beads you're showing...the appearance of the eye being wrapped around the end is really just a blurry cross section, but just my opinion...if I can find my bead(s) I will show...the strand you show looks like a nice one, the Venetian fancies are some of my favorite...

...I have one too. There seem to be many but this is not imo just having been broken this way. What could cause equatorial breaks like this? Usually beads are chipped but not here. Curious. Is there another explanation? Just wondering....
Thanks.