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If the Dot Looks Like a Shooting Star... It's a Good Thing?


jkrispies

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Before I start, I should point out that I've been an "iron sight shooter" for many years. Recently, though, I've begun focussing on shooting a steel rimfire rifle with a dot, so I'm something of a new dot user, at least proficiently.

It's tricky to articulate, but when I'm transitioning properly between targets, the dot looks a bit like a meteorite with a trailing tail (or, perhaps, a 4th of July sparkler that's being waved in the darkness) before solidifying into an actual dot when I take my shot, and then I'm onto the next target, and it's a shooting star again until I snap it to a stop on target.

To break it down more specifically: if I'm shooting properly, I aim at Target 1 (and it's a dot), I fire and then look at Target 2, bringing the dot into the target I'm focussed upon (now it's a stringing meteorite travelling through my peripheral vision), and I then snap the dot to a stop on Target 2 (and it's a defined dot again).

Alternately, if I'm shooting poorly and tracking the dot, it goes something like this: I aim at Target 1 (and it's a dot), I fire and then don't look at Target 2 but rather track the dot as the gun travels to Target 2 (so it remains a focussed dot), and then I snap the dot to a stop on Target 2 (and it's a still an unchanged dot).

So this meteorite effect is... a good thing? I'm interpreting this to mean that the meteorite effect is a tangible indication that I'm snapping my eyes to the target rather than tracking the dot. Does this sound correct to folks? Or does the fact that I see the trailing dot indicate that my focus is perhaps not where it's supposed to be?

[NOTE: I'm realizing as I finish this that I dryfire in somewhat low light at 6:30am, which could be contributing to this effect. I don't actually recall seeing it in mid-day live fire, though I might...]

Thanks,

J

PS: I started to put this in the "Little Things I've Noticed" section, but I'm approaching this more as a question from me on advice for improvement rather than the declaration of a breakthrough...

Edited by jkrispies
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Sorry to say it, but that's a sign of getting old. The eyes don't refresh as fast as they do when they were young. I notice the same thing. Adjusting the brightness down may help, I adjust mine down to the point where the "bloom" around the dot disappears. I only notice the bloom indoors or outside when the light is dim. Full sun days, I just turn the brightness to the top.

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The dot is already low, on medium with a Fadtfire III. If I put it on low it's almost unusable. I'm thinking this effect is aggravated by the lower light at sunrise when I'm dry firing.

To be clear, im not talking about a bloom around the dot. The dot is clear when stationary. This is more of a trail as the dot is moving to the next target. I already have corrective lenses for my old eyes. Old eyes are part of the reason for switching to the dot, lol.

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The dot is already low, on medium with a Fadtfire III. If I put it on low it's almost unusable. I'm thinking this effect is aggravated by the lower light at sunrise when I'm dry firing.

To be clear, im not talking about a bloom around the dot. The dot is clear when stationary. This is more of a trail as the dot is moving to the next target. I already have corrective lenses for my old eyes. Old eyes are part of the reason for switching to the dot, lol.

like I said, it's a function of "old eyes", same effect as driving at night. Anything bright will leave "trails" if you follow their movement. Only cure I can think of is a time machine. If I snap my eyes to the next target and let the dot catch up, I don't have the problem. (and it's faster too).

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[medical nerd]

The human eye responds to light at a cycle of around 10-15hz (cycles per second). Motion pictures and video take advantage of that by running at frame rates of 24 and higher.

Combine that with what are called physiologic afterimages. That's the ghosting effect we get after overstimulating the photoreceptors in our eyes. It's more noticeable with high contrast and intense light sources like camera flashes.

A red dot causing photoreceptors to be oversaturated, with a series of ghost images captured at the eye's native frame rate, will get visually processed as a streak of light. Or something like that. I'm not an eye specialist.

[/medical nerd]

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The dot is already low, on medium with a Fadtfire III. If I put it on low it's almost unusable. I'm thinking this effect is aggravated by the lower light at sunrise when I'm dry firing.

To be clear, im not talking about a bloom around the dot. The dot is clear when stationary. This is more of a trail as the dot is moving to the next target. I already have corrective lenses for my old eyes. Old eyes are part of the reason for switching to the dot, lol.

like I said, it's a function of "old eyes", same effect as driving at night. Anything bright will leave "trails" if you follow their movement. Only cure I can think of is a time machine. If I snap my eyes to the next target and let the dot catch up, I don't have the problem. (and it's faster too).

By snapping your eyes to the next target, you've given the photoreceptors in your eyes a chance to recover. We naturally move our eyes fractionally away from constant bright sources to keep that from happening. A prolonged hard focus on the dot will make the effect more noticeable.

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Do you have an astigmatism ?

Yes, but it is corrected.

If I snap my eyes to the next target and let the dot catch up, I don't have the problem. (and it's faster too).

I've been holding off on responding because I don't think I'm stating myself clearly. I do snap my eyes to the next target and let the dot catch up (and, yes, it's faster too) which is when I see the trail peripherally as the dot enters my vision prior to stopping on the target, at which point the trail disappears into a perfectly defined dot.

I'm totally accepting that it could be a function of my eyes being more aged, as well as having pre-existing issues, albeit corrected ones.

SleepDr, by your statement "A red dot causing photoreceptors to be oversaturated, with a series of ghost images captured at the eye's native frame rate, will get visually processed as a streak of light," are you essentially backing up jrswanson1's assertion that my dot is turned up too high? (FYI, if this is the case, I may be on the way to a fix as I've been using a 3moa dot with little brightness control, but I have on order an 8moa dot with a great deal of brightness control. It should be here within the next week or two. My assumption is that the larger dot will allow me to function with a lower brightness level, thereby possibly eliminating the streaking... maybe?)

I should also point out that this issue doesn't have any negative effect on my shooting that I can tell. For instance, I recently shot Showdown for an overall 7.9 seconds, averaging 1.97 seconds per string. This is just something that I've noticed, and I'm trying to understand if it's good, bad, or irrelevant.

Edited by jkrispies
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I can't really say that you're running it too bright, since it's not seeming to affect your time.

When I mentioned visual fatigue from keeping the dot centered, I also forgot a different aspect. With your eyes snapped to the target, the dot is moving more in the periphery of your vision. We have more rods than cones there, so more sensitivity to light. Twilight and dim lighting will make the effect more pronounced.

It will be interesting to see if your larger dot run at a lower intensity has the same effect. I waffle back and forth between dot sizes on my rifles, but have spent more time with a 2MOA Aimpoint. When really dialed in, I can see the dot moving as a little squiggle in rapid fire strings. FWIW, this astigmatism gets to be a real nuisance as my eyes get older.

You actually have the visual awareness to observe a normal phenomenon. IMO, that's something worth giving yourself a pat on the back.

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I can't really say that you're running it too bright, since it's not seeming to affect your time.

When I mentioned visual fatigue from keeping the dot centered, I also forgot a different aspect. With your eyes snapped to the target, the dot is moving more in the periphery of your vision. We have more rods than cones there, so more sensitivity to light. Twilight and dim lighting will make the effect more pronounced.

It will be interesting to see if your larger dot run at a lower intensity has the same effect. I waffle back and forth between dot sizes on my rifles, but have spent more time with a 2MOA Aimpoint. When really dialed in, I can see the dot moving as a little squiggle in rapid fire strings. FWIW, this astigmatism gets to be a real nuisance as my eyes get older.

You actually have the visual awareness to observe a normal phenomenon. IMO, that's something worth giving yourself a pat on the back.

:cheers:

I'll report again when my new dot arrives.

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1. take a cell phone pic through the optic and look at it. is it still a shooting star? yes, your optic is not that good. no, your optic is great.

2. you probably have an astigmatism in one or both eyes. i'm not a dr of ophthalmology, so have no idea if you can do anything about it. my dr told me i couldn't.

3. run it at the brightness you need to see it and no more. replace batteries sooner rather than later as they aren't that expensive.

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You have astigmatism/old eye problem. I have the same problem and see a comet through Eotech, Aimpoint, etc. when I wear my distance or bifocal glasses. Recently, I switched to single vision glasses focused at 24" (for computer use) and the dot looks great again. See if that helps.

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You have astigmatism/old eye problem. I have the same problem and see a comet through Eotech, Aimpoint, etc. when I wear my distance or bifocal glasses. Recently, I switched to single vision glasses focused at 24" (for computer use) and the dot looks great again. See if that helps.

^^^^^This +1

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You have astigmatism/old eye problem. I have the same problem and see a comet through Eotech, Aimpoint, etc. when I wear my distance or bifocal glasses. Recently, I switched to single vision glasses focused at 24" (for computer use) and the dot looks great again. See if that helps.

^^^^^This +1

Will give that a try once I renew this subscription.

I will say that I practiced today-- put 300 rounds downrange during full daylight and when I was driving home from the session I realized that I hadn't noticed any streaking. I'm thinking that the lack of adjustability of brightness in my dot is contributing to my problem when combined with the low(ish) light during my dryfire practice time.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Got the higher end optic, and it's still there. I really think it's related to using the dot in lower light when I practice in the morning, as I don't see it in full daylight. Having said that, my glasses are due for a renewal so I'm going to look at a new prescription with a specified focus distance. Thanks, guys!

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If you get them to focus up close they won't be sharp at a distance. You might try getting the focus length on the dominant eye the same distance as the dot is from your eye and the other lens focused for distance. Same set up as you would use for iron sights.

Some people can't do that but if you can it really works well. I've been getting my shooting glasses done like that since the mid Eighties and it has always worked well for me.

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The red dots are designed to make the light rays coming off the glass more or less parallel just as other distant objects. Essentially it looks like the dot is the same distance as the targets. If you set the focus on the glass, the dot will look like a blob of LED puke. The best approach is to use your distance-corrected prescription. A near focus can work for iron sights but is completely wrong for a dot.

Later,

Chuck

PS: and I have had astigmatism correction in my glasses for at least 30 years. And when I have cataract surgery, the correction will be built in. If your doc says it can';t be fixed, time to get a new doc....

Edited by ChuckS
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Yes, Chuck S is correct about this.

When I had cataract surgery done I had them make the sharp focus at about 2 feet as I had always been near sighted and wore glasses since about the third grade. So I wear glasses all the time for distance and take them off for anything close. Just a lifetime habit and I also don't like shirts with pockets and did not want to carry reading glasses around.

I went and looked thru a dot sight without my glasses and it looked like about 6 segments, looks almost perfect with the glasses on.

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The red dots are designed to make the light rays coming off the glass more or less parallel just as other distant objects. Essentially it looks like the dot is the same distance as the targets. If you set the focus on the glass, the dot will look like a blob of LED puke. The best approach is to use your distance-corrected prescription. A near focus can work for iron sights but is completely wrong for a dot.

Ok, good advice. I've had the focus set at arms length in the past but I was shooting with irons exclusively. Methinks there will be more dots than irons in my future... Thanks, John

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I went and looked thru a dot sight without my glasses and it looked like about 6 segments, looks almost perfect with the glasses on.

Uncorrected, I see the "dot" with my right eye as a ~8 moa x 24 moa bar tilted from 11:30 to 5:30 and my left is a ~ 8 moa x 32 moa bar tilted from 6:30 to 12:30. I took a sketch of this to one of the eye docs that I had pretty good luck with and he said that I pretty much had mapped my astigmatism for both eyes. Corrected, it is pretty much a clean dot with either eye.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I see my reddot as bunch of grapes with my dominant right eye and almost a round dot with my left eye. But I dont care how its shaped. All i care is it is on the target or not. Its the only thing that affects my shooting.

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  • 6 months later...

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