Is learning to shoot with both eyes open necessary?

[canadianbacon]

I keep finding threads that talk about how you need to learn to shoot with both eyes open.

What are the advantages of both eyes open? I tried it and I didn't shoot well, and honestly it just didn't feel right.

I don't have a problem with a red dot or eotech both eyes open, but on a pistol it just feels unnatural and I don't shoot as well.

[lugnut]

1M dollar question. I can't seem to be able to figure out how to shoot with both eyes open. I just get overloaded and can't focus on the front sight. Everyone says you lose peripheral vision but I don't seem to see this as a problem. My one eye seems to have little problem picking up the next target- whether it's close or far.

I can't wait to hear from more on this topic.

[Clint-M]

The tape trick and bench rest pistol shooting worked wonders for me and really "opened my eyes" to what I was missing. For whatever reason I feel the urge to flinch when I shoot with one eye open only but when I finally managed to keep both open and actually see what was happening around me I could finally follow my shots/sights and identify a ton of problems I was having with transitions and sight alignment on the move.

CM

[sroe3]

I've always shot with both eyes open. This year as I've learned front sight focus I've had more trouble with ghost or double images. I'll close my non dominate eye just enough to make the ghost disappear when it bothers me. I'm planning to try the scotch tape on the shooting lens trick some time. Shooting is a straight line thing, it's transitions, movement, reloads, etc. where depth perception is more critical.

[TMC]

BJ shoots with one eye closed

[Xander]

When Eric Grauffel shoots in PD or Standard, on closer target he shoots with both eyes open, farther distance like 12m or so, one eye closed, for better accuracy he says

[Dillon b]

I believe that it depends on the person, and their eyes. There are some people that try and try but can never make it work. I think that it is beneficial, as it is less strenuous on your eyes. I dont think it hurts all that much in the scheme of things if you cant do it though. Just shoot

[Hi-Power Jack]

I don't have a problem with a red dot both eyes open

why do you shoot with both eyes open with a red dot?

because it's more natural, faster?

same reason. can't run with one eye closed

[mildot1]

1. Depth perception is better.

2. Reduces eye strain. When you close one eye that pupil trys to dilate due to loss of light, this forces the open eye to try to stay in sync = strain.

3. Wider field of view.

4. Reduces the amount of "percieved lead" on moving targets.

FWIW

[canadianbacon]

Thanks for all the replies. Does just squinting one eye help?

What I call one eye closed is actually one eye squinted, light still gets in and I don't shut it tight, just enough to get rid of the "ghost"

Edited April 26, 2012 by canadianbacon

[motosapiens]

Thanks for all the replies. Does just squinting one eye help?

What I call one eye closed is actually one eye squinted, light still gets in and I don't shut it tight, just enough to get rid of the "ghost"

I learned to keep both eyes open in one evening of dry-fire practice. At first, squinting slightly to remove the ghost helped, and I still occasionall do it in matches, especially on longer shots. Most of the time tho my brain doesn't seem to see or notice the 'ghost'.

I never shot competively with one eye closed, so it's hard for me to say if or how much it's helped, but I do shoot rifle with one eye closed and it feels a little disorienting to keep one eye closed for very long.

[canadianbacon]

I'll try it again this weekend

[mda]

I'll try it again this weekend

This is not really something that happens in a weekend for most people, and some can never seem to overcome the problem. Mostly takes lots of practice. Like some have already suggested add a small piece of frosted tape in the upper corner of the lens on the non-dominate eye so it just blocks the front sight while aiming. After a while you will be able to remove the tape with no issues.

MDA

[canadianbacon]

I'll try it again this weekend

This is not really something that happens in a weekend for most people, and some can never seem to overcome the problem. Mostly takes lots of practice. Like some have already suggested add a small piece of frosted tape in the upper corner of the lens on the non-dominate eye so it just blocks the front sight while aiming. After a while you will be able to remove the tape with no issues.

MDA

I'm picking up my 22/45 I ordered and 4 bricks of .22, if I can't get it down or still hate it I'm just going to shoot the way that feels natural

[Ben Stoeger]

Shooting with both eyes open has a couple of minor advantages. You have a bit more field of view and theoretically can transition faster.

Most people find it easier to get a hard front sight focus if they close one eye. This in theory makes you more accurate.

I shoot with both eyes open, but I don't feel it is strictly needed to shoot extremely well.

[BigGabe]

I've been shooting with both eyes open with the shotgun for years. I would think the benifits would carry over to pistol as well. I'm gonna give it a try.

[AustinL911]

Thanks for all the replies. Does just squinting one eye help?

What I call one eye closed is actually one eye squinted, light still gets in and I don't shut it tight, just enough to get rid of the "ghost"

I learned to keep both eyes open in one evening of dry-fire practice. At first, squinting slightly to remove the ghost helped, and I still occasionall do it in matches, especially on longer shots. Most of the time tho my brain doesn't seem to see or notice the 'ghost'.

I never shot competively with one eye closed, so it's hard for me to say if or how much it's helped, but I do shoot rifle with one eye closed and it feels a little disorienting to keep one eye closed for very long.

Same here. I'm not sure what it was about that evening that I picked it up, but I just did. I bought SA's dry fire book and promptly went home to start playing around with it. I decided then and there that I was done shooting with one eye closed because it tended to give me a headache and/or make my other eye water, causing it to get blurry as well. My goal was to start, from the beginning, with doing the drills with both eyes open.

I found that I had to play with the focus of my eyes to get it to work correctly, if that makes sense. I can do it now, but I still need to work on it as sometimes I don't get the focus right off the bat. If I had to describe it, I'd say it's kind of like those stereograph pictures you looked at when you were a kid and you had to get your focus just right to 'see it'. That's the best way I have to describe being able to shoot with both eyes open without seeing a ghost image. It just seems to disappear for me when I get the focus right.

[Shawneeboy87]

I've been messing around with try to shoot with both eyes open lately, but I have been having major problems following the front sight.

I've got bigger problems to solve first -- like accuracy, because apparently that's important

[theycallmeingot]

squinting or closing one eye introduces stress in the face while you're shooting. that puts a damper on the whole trying to relax thing.

i started out shooting with one eye closed. i just thought that was how you're supposed to do it. i'm cross-eye dominant, so i never even thought of trying both eyes open. When I started trying both eyes open (with scotch tape over the left eye), I slowed down for a short time while I got used to it. But now I am way better off for it.

Before, it went like this: Look at target both eyes open, draw, close left eye, shoot twice, either A. transition slowly with one eye closed to target, or B. open eye, transition to target, close left eye, shoot. None of this is really actively thought about in the process, but I can tell that it takes time to do it. it may be literally milliseconds, but it all adds up.

Now it is simply shoot. with no thought for how it is done, and transitions for me are much better with both eyes open. Sometimes, I warm up during practice shooting some steel challenge courses, and I'm going REALLY slow, and I'm like WTF? Then, I realize i didn't tape my glasses. I put the tape on and the eye stays open and speeds dramatically improve.

just my .02

[DoubleL]

I don't have years of one eye shooting to overcome, but the squinting seems to work real good for me. Most of my shooting before pistol was all AR and an EoTech. Maybe that helped. If I start seeing a ghost to the right, right handed and eyed, I also know that I'm focusing too hard on the target. Playing with distance to target and focus coupled with the squint seems to working so far, for me at least.

One thing I noticed, while dryfiring in my garage. Really bright light seemed to make it harder to see only one sight with two eyes while aiming across my garage. With only the light above my bench on I could almost feel my vision change. Very strange. So play with the lighting indoors and maybe get a spot that makes it easier to focus at first.

Granted I am brand new so take this with a grain of salt.... I swear that my accuracy goes up significantly two eyed vs one, at appropriate distances.

[jdphotoguy]

Can't say that it's necessary, but given that our sport is dynamic, requires often a great deal of movement and is not static like Bullseye shooting, having both eyes open to see your surroundings has to be a big plus.

Edited April 27, 2012 by jdphotoguy

[lugnut]

Before, it went like this: Look at target both eyes open, draw, close left eye, shoot twice, either A. transition slowly with one eye closed to target, or B. open eye, transition to target, close left eye, shoot. None of this is really actively thought about in the process, but I can tell that it takes time to do it. it may be literally milliseconds, but it all adds up.

Here's the way I do it.

On the draw- focus on target if I can. At buzzer draw the gun and as I'm pushing out I'm closing my non dominant eye. When on target fire once, maybe twice with one eye. If I'm shooting another target after- I quickly move my dominant eye to that target- the head and gun follow. WHen the sights are the way I want them I fire again. Repeat. If I'm reloading or moving I have both eyes open. When the gun pushes out to targets my non dominant eye closes again. I usually don't notice it. I don't notice any issues with transitions. I don't have a problem with peripheral vision. Maybe I'm wrong but I don't notice it as a problem. I'd like to shoot with both eyes I guess... but I can't seem to get my eyes from the target to the front sights quickly at all and sometimes I tend to almost ignore the sights. WIth one eye that is very easy- maybe even easier than two because I don't have any real depth perception.... it's a 2 D view of my sights overlaid on the target... but that's what I want. I know some real good shooters that do this.. and most will admit to at least squinting their weak eye at farther targets...

Maybe when I have more time I'll really try this again.

[JAFO]

I've been shooting with both eyes open with the shotgun for years. I would think the benifits would carry over to pistol as well. I'm gonna give it a try.

When I started USPSA, I had been doing a lot of informal clay shooting. The main problem I had when transitioning to pistol shooting is that I was so used to focusing on the bird with the shotgun that I found myself focusing on the target with the pistol, too. Sure, both eyes were open, but the front sight was blurred and I was all over the place.

I've been noticing that my accuracy is declining, and I'm planning on doing a lot of group shooting in the near future to go back to the basics. But I've also been catching myself focusing on the targets again and I can't help but wonder if I'm accepting a less-than-acceptable sight picture because of it, so I'm working on getting the focus right with both eyes open again.

In the past, I tried tape (or the more field expedient spot of lip balm) to blur the non-dominant eye. It worked, but it gave me a headache by the end of the match because my eyes were never able to focus the same. That's another reason I tried the lip balm. I was wiping it off after I shot a stage to avoid the headache, then reapplying before the next stage. It was a pain and I kept forgetting to do it, so I quit doing it altogether.

I tried some eye exercises at home where I propped the unloaded gun up at eye level, lined it up with a spot on the wall. Then I'll just sit at arm's length and practice focusing my vision from the wall to the front sight and back again (propping just keeps me from having to hold the gun up for long periods). The ghost images were giving me trouble, especially the rear sight. It's all black, but it's close enough to the front sight that when it's ghosted, the two rears blend together into one big one with two notches. When I try to pick out the edges of the correct notch, the focus shifts back and the front doubles. Very frustrating.

So I tried something to help that. I applied some white paint to the outside edges of the rear. This seemed to help a little, as it broke up the all black doubled rear into two narrower black sights separated by a white strip. It's kind of like a poor man's version of a Warren Tactical rear. I tried it on the range last night, and I was able to pick out the edges of the rear more easily while shooting groups. If I like it enough, I may just file the sight down to mimic the Warren. Of course, standing still shooting groups isn't the same as shooting a stage, so I plan to keep practicing the focusing exercises, too.

Edited May 4, 2012 by JAFO

[theycallmeingot]

I've been shooting with both eyes open with the shotgun for years. I would think the benifits would carry over to pistol as well. I'm gonna give it a try.

When I started USPSA, I had been doing a lot of informal clay shooting. The main problem I had when transitioning to pistol shooting is that I was so used to focusing on the bird with the shotgun that I found myself focusing on the target with the pistol, too. Sure, both eyes were open, but the front sight was blurred and I was all over the place.

I've been noticing that my accuracy is declining, and I'm planning on doing a lot of group shooting in the near future to go back to the basics. But I've also been catching myself focusing on the targets again and I can't help but wonder if I'm accepting a less-than-acceptable sight picture because of it, so I'm working on getting the focus right with both eyes open again.

In the past, I tried tape (or the more field expedient spot of lip balm) to blur the non-dominant eye. It worked, but it gave me a headache by the end of the match because my eyes were never able to focus the same. That's another reason I tried the lip balm. I was wiping it off after I shot a stage to avoid the headache, then reapplying before the next stage. It was a pain and I kept forgetting to do it, so I quit doing it altogether.

I tried some eye exercises at home where I propped the unloaded gun up at eye level, lined it up with a spot on the wall. Then I'll just sit at arm's length and practice focusing my vision from the wall to the front sight and back again (propping just keeps me from having to hold the gun up for long periods). The ghost images were giving me trouble, especially the rear sight. It's all black, but it's close enough to the front sight that when it's ghosted, the two rears blend together into one big one with two notches. When I try to pick out the edges of the correct notch, the focus shifts back and the front doubles. Very frustrating.

So I tried something to help that. I applied some white paint to the outside edges of the rear. This seemed to help a little, as it broke up the all black doubled rear into two narrower black sights separated by a white strip. It's kind of like a poor man's version of a Warren Tactical rear. I tried it on the range last night, and I was able to pick out the edges of the rear more easily while shooting groups. If I like it enough, I may just file the sight down to mimic the Warren. Of course, standing still shooting groups isn't the same as shooting a stage, so I plan to keep practicing the focusing exercises, too.

i'm surprised to hear you had headaches with the tape/lip balm on. i've been doing it for a few months, now and i forget the tape is even there. i keep it on my glasses while we eat after the match sometimes, and don't notice it until i put the shades back on walking out to the car. i even just recently etched the top portion of the lense to be like a permanent tape/lip balm.

i think it's important to say that sometimes looking at the targets is faster/better than focusing on the front sight. brian enos talks about the different types of focus in his book. basically, there are certain times/distances where focusing on the targets rather than the front sight yields better results. i am no GM, but i only find myself focusing on the front sight instead of the targets at shots past 25 yards or so. I think it's up to each person and their eyesight how far they can shoot this way before accuracy drops off, and if you're seeing a correlation between bad accuracy and looking at the targets, you may try shooting at them closer, and see if/when you can use that type of focus. I've noticed lately that my indexing is to the point where i only need to see that the sights are lined up when i draw on target 1, and after that i'm just pointing my body and a blurry gun/sights at the targets, knowing that the blur is lined up sights, basically letting the shot go off when that blur lines up in the middle of the IPSC target. on steel, this type of focus almost always fails me, and i resort to looking at the front sight.

[canadianbacon]

I tried shooting both eyes open, and I was faster, but I did it a bit differently.

Instead of focusing on the front sight, I focused on the targets, but the sight is also clear in my sights.

Is this bad? When I focus on just the front sight the target is impossible to find almost, I'm slower, and the target ghosts horribly