Advanced Marksmanship eye patch?

[taseal]

So I'm going to blame this on LASIK but if I keep my eye closed for extended period of time (like squinting I guess while shooting) the eye that was closed gets some weird hard to focus like problem. I pretty much can't seem to focus on small objects. It's hard to explain, perhaps I'm not the only one with this problem

that being said I wanted to see if anyone here uses an eye patch or something to shoot. I'm a lefty, so it would be my right that stays closed.

 

[Christopher Rance]

Re: eye patch?

I've used one before on long periods of observation. I always keep one in my bag.

 

[Killer Spade 13]

Re: eye patch?

Something we did in college with our 22 target rifles was to take a piece of black constructioni paper, double it over, punch a small hole in it and attach it to the rear sight by unscrewing the rear aperture, inserting it through the hole, and screwing it back into the sight.

We would shoot for hours, and hours. In this fashion we could keep both eyes open eliminating any additional induced strain on the eyes.

Don't know how you could make something like that for a scope, but the concept is the same.

 

[TNT]

Re: eye patch?

A lot of HP shooters use some form of obstruction for the non-sighting eye so they can keep both open and still only focus on the sighting eye - usually it is something that gets attached to the eye protection (glasses). Either tape a piece of dark paper over one of side of your eye pro, or get a flip doohickey that clips onto your eye pro. I don't really understand the construction paper put into the sight, unless you need a way to do this without a set of shooting glasses.

Ultimately, it's good for target shooting, but not recommended if you want to be keep more spatial awareness as the non-sighting eye can still pick up object motion and such. It's usually recommended regardless of what setup you use to keep both eyes open so you don't strain your eyes and negatively impact your sight picture.

 

[Greg Langelius *]

Re: eye patch?

I respect the advice above.

If you can't resolve your issue that way, try using something that's translucent, but doesn't block the light. I find that some Magic Tape applied directly onto the optical center of the safety specs lens covering the non-aiming eye can work better. We leave both eyes open, but only the aiming eye actually has a working image to process. They other eye, hovever, still receives a mormally equal amount of light.

When the non shooting eye does not receive light, the other eye's pupil opens wider. This is a physical reflex, and cannot be overridden.

As photographers know, a wider pupil (F-stop) sacrifices resolution for light gathering.

Anything that allows the aiming eye's pupil to remain smaller will aid in resolving a sharper image. By using a translucent lens treatment, as opposed to an opaque one, this prenciple is better upheld.

This is not junk science. I learned this from the Marine Corps Pistol Teams at Quantico, VA.

Greg

 

[taseal]

Re: eye patch?

so do you guys get that problem too when you close one eye for a while? I was blaming it on LASIK but...

 

[Killer Spade 13]

Re: eye patch?

"I don't really understand the construction paper put into the sight, unless you need a way to do this without a set of shooting glasses."

That's because we didn't wear shooting glasses.

 

[TNT]

Re: eye patch?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Greg Langelius *</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I respect the advice above.

If you can't resolve your issue that way, try using something that's translucent, but doesn't block the light. I find that some Magic Tape applied directly onto the optical center of the safety specs lens covering the non-aiming eye can work better. We leave both eyes open, but only the aiming eye actually has a working image to process. They other eye, hovever, still receives a mormally equal amount of light.

When the non shooting eye does not receive light, the other eye's pupil opens wider. This is a physical reflex, and cannot be overridden.

As photographers know, a wider pupil (F-stop) sacrifices resolution for light gathering.

Anything that allows the aiming eye's pupil to remain smaller will aid in resolving a sharper image. By using a translucent lens treatment, as opposed to an opaque one, this prenciple is better upheld.

This is not junk science. I learned this from the Marine Corps Pistol Teams at Quantico, VA.

Greg </div></div>

That's a great point Greg, and one you'd think I'd have thought of given my infatuation with cameras. Neutral shoe polish should work well for this, no?

Killer Spade, the paper trick makes more sense now. I won't shoot without eye pro. Couple times I did I got some gas in the eyes and was crying all day about it.

Edit to add: and to taseal, I can't be sure, but I don't think it's the LASIK. Even with both eyes open, if I stare at the sights too long, I get image burn-in and won't even notice the front post start dancing around. Then after a while I'll just lose concentration and start bouncing back to focusing on the target. Same happens for me with the scope. I think it's more just simple eye strain. As with most things in shooting, relaxed is better.

 

[Olivers_AR]

Re: eye patch?

There are translucent lenses covers/patches that Bullseye shooters use, again so that both eyes can stay open and a reasonable amount of light gets to both eyes.

 

[Killer Spade 13]

Re: eye patch?

TNT,

We were shooting small bore 3 position, Anschutz 1416 and Winchester 52-D. Not too much of an issue with eye injury issues.

 

[Mister Ouchie]

Re: eye patch?

I use my rear scope cap, I just put something to wedge it so that when it's open it occludes my left eye when positioned correctly.

 

[WadeP]

Re: eye patch?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Greg Langelius *</div><div class="ubbcode-body">

If you can't resolve your issue that way, try using something that's translucent, but doesn't block the light. I find that some Magic Tape applied directly onto the optical center of the safety specs lens covering the non-aiming eye can work better. We leave both eyes open, but only the aiming eye actually has a working image to process. They other eye, hovever, still receives a mormally equal amount of light.

Greg </div></div>

This works for me. I did this when I was shooting smallbore. For me, just a small piece of tape did the trick, probably less than 1/4" square applied not to the center, but 2 o'clock on my left (non-dominant) eye's shooting glasses lens. Sorta between my eyeball and my nose, if that makes sense.

I don't know about blocking light, but it did the same as slightly squinting my non-dominant eye, just without the muscle strain from doing that for a long time.