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Beginning shooter, extremely right eye dominant. Suggestions?


KyleJ

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Hey all, I am currently collecting gear for my first season of USPSA. I have a 9mm TSO on the way and will be shooting in the limited division. 

 

I am a late bloomer to shooting sports and have a question. I am extremely right eye dominant. When I pick a focal point both eyes open and make a triangle around it with my hands, when I close my right eye it completely disappears from my field of view. When I view with my left eye closed it hardly moves at all. I've never been able to shoot any optic both eyes open, and find myself straining to keep my left eye closed after some time on the range. 

 

Does anyone have suggestions for exercises or possibly form to help in this regard? I'm not chasing points of championships, just looking to become a better shooter and have fun. 

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Hey all, I am currently collecting gear for my first season of USPSA. I have a 9mm TSO on the way and will be shooting in the limited division. 
 
I am a late bloomer to shooting sports and have a question. I am extremely right eye dominant. When I pick a focal point both eyes open and make a triangle around it with my hands, when I close my right eye it completely disappears from my field of view. When I view with my left eye closed it hardly moves at all. I've never been able to shoot any optic both eyes open, and find myself straining to keep my left eye closed after some time on the range. 
 
Does anyone have suggestions for exercises or possibly form to help in this regard? I'm not chasing points of championships, just looking to become a better shooter and have fun. 
Bring gun up to dominant eye with both eyes open. Some people will cant their head but it's easier to bring the gun to the dominant eye.

Or, put some clear tape on your left glasses lens and keep both eyes open

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

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I think you are in the same position as me except with the dominant eye switched.

 

You are going to naturally bring your gun up to your dominant eye. I am cross eye dominant (left eye is 20/15 right eye is definitely not 20/20 haha). I shoot pistols right handed but bring the pistol to my left eye. I ended up re-learning to shoot rifles and shotguns with my left hand 🤨 

 

That being said, are you able to get a clear sight picture both eyes open when bringing the gun up to your natural aim point (IE behind your right eye)? If not the tape solution is a good idea. I'd suggest finding a way to slowly get used to both eyes open. 

 

Out of curiosity are you left handed or right handed?

Edited by jschroep
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Right handed. I will practice bringing the gun up to my dominant eye and working both eyes open. I've shot archery my whole life with my left eye closed, but the stance there is quite different, you draw to your dominant eye and everything is very relaxed. When attending long shoots with my bow I have used a literal eye patch for my left eye, but that's a diciplin where you're stationary for every shot. 

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I just tried with my carry gun and even when I bring it up to my right eye (turns out this is how I've been doing it since I started shooting) and keep both eyes open, I lose the front sight post when I try to focus my vision. 

 

Right eye only, all is good. 

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You will not be able to focus both eyes on the sight, use your dominant eye only. 
 

Try training your eyes to only sight with your right eye while both eyes open. A trick that I learned here was to put a very small piece of painters tape over the left lens of my shooting glasses. Put it over the spot where you would normally see the sight, that way you keep your  peripheral vision but can not see the sight.  You will eventually train your eyes to pick up the sight with your right eye. 

 

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You need practice. Start from dozens of repetitions and work up

 

Right handed with dominant right eye is the simplest and easiest combination. With practice, you'll forget about the non-dominant eye. The dominant eye will do the aiming while the non-dominant helps you function in other ways.

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I'm right handed and weak right eye dominant. I will readily switch to my left eye if I can't pick something up with the right, which caused a lot of issues for me when starting out. I can't keep my left eye closed once the buzzer goes off, so I had to come up with a different plan.

I regularly put a paster on my shooting glasses when I'm on deck, just enough to block my left eye from seeing the front sight under recoil. I can still keep both eyes open for transitions. Then I take the paster off and stick it on my earmuffs when I'm not shooting.

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I used the tape method when I started. Bought a cheap pair of safety glasses and put clear tape on it that was slightly opaque. Just the tape dispenser variety and I put a few pieces right in the center of the left lense.

 

This allowed me to still see out of my glasses but blurred my left eye enough that I couldn't focus on the sights at all.

 

Not sure if it's the best method, but it's what worked for me. Still have those glasses and occasionally use them during dry fire.

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15 hours ago, KyleJ said:

 when I bring it up to my right eye  and keep both eyes open, I lose the front post

 

I'm confused.   If you are right eye dominant and bring the sight up to right eye,

the front sight should be clear ???

 

You shouldn't have to "focus your vision", it should already be crystal clear.

 

What do you see before you "focus your vision" ?

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19 minutes ago, Hi-Power Jack said:

I'm confused.   If you are right eye dominant and bring the sight up to right eye,

the front sight should be clear ???

 

You shouldn't have to "focus your vision", it should already be crystal clear.

 

What do you see before you "focus your vision" ?

 

It's hard to explain, when I bring the sights into my field of view with both eyes open the front sight post becomes blurred/doubled. When I say focus my vision, I mean aligning the front sight post over my target. I brought it up with my optometrist and she did a couple basic exercises and basically told me my brain is using the majority of the information from my right eye and only a small portion from my left. 

 

If I draw using my right eye only, I am able to see my objective, bring the front sight post to my field of vision and remain clear. 

 

Like I said, it's hard to explain in words what I'm seeing. It's also totally possible I am doing something wrong. The extent of my training basically comes from picking up a fun a gun and enjoying shooting. 

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That's weird.

 

I'm right handed and I have 20/20 corrected in my right eye, and roughly 20/400 in my left. So my brain is getting basically zero information from my left eye. I don't have issues like you're describing.

 

Like others mentioned I would try putting a piece of tape over the lens of your left eye and see what that does for you.

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16 hours ago, KyleJ said:

I just tried with my carry gun and even when I bring it up to my right eye (turns out this is how I've been doing it since I started shooting) and keep both eyes open, I lose the front sight post when I try to focus my vision. 

 

Right eye only, all is good. 

You’re experiencing the “ghosting” effect of looking at a close object having both eyes open since you haven’t trained your dominant eye to “focus” even when your non-dominant eye is looking at the same object. Your vision is not diverging into an object so you’re seeing a shadow when the non-dominant eye is open.

 

Practice is the key. You can buy a Brock string from amazon and practice with it.

image.jpeg.b65737795d6ca91e36c2f23c3609db5c.jpeg

 

Edited by George16
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Thank you everyone for the suggestions. I have a set of the WX shooting glasses with the replaceable lenses so I'm going to start by taping one while doing dryfire practice from now on. 

 

I think a lot of it comes from the fact that I've shot my bow with my left eye closed for the last 15+ years. With a bow all of my shots are stationary very rarely pressed for time. It's going to take training reps to adjust. 

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6 minutes ago, Racinready300ex said:

That's weird.

 

I'm right handed and I have 20/20 corrected in my right eye, and roughly 20/400 in my left. So my brain is getting basically zero information from my left eye. I don't have issues like you're describing.

 

Like others mentioned I would try putting a piece of tape over the lens of your left eye and see what that does for you.

 

It's strange, I'm 20/20 in both eyes with my contacts in. Both eyes have the same prescription for lenses. I explained it to my optometrist and that was what she told me after a few exercises but she isn't exactly s shooting enthusiast so she didn't have the best advice for workarounds, haha.  

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8 minutes ago, George16 said:

You’re experiencing the “ghosting” effect of looking at a close object having both eyes open since you haven’t trained your dominant eye to “focus” even when your non-dominant eye is looking at the same object. Your vision is not diverging into an object so you’re seeing a shadow when the non-dominant eye is open.

 

Practice is the key. You can buy a Brock string from amazon and practice with it.

image.jpeg.b65737795d6ca91e36c2f23c3609db5c.jpeg

 

 

This makes a lot of sense. When I look at an illuminated RDS reticle I get the same image, but dimmer of the reticle ghosted off to the side and slightly elevated. One eye open, all GTG. 

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Little bit of tape on the left eye of the shooting glasses is a good way to train the brain to ignore the input from your left eye. Hopefully after a while you will be able to get by without it. Not sure if it will be before or after you ditch that 9mm limited gun. Time will tell

 

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52 minutes ago, waktasz said:

Little bit of tape on the left eye of the shooting glasses is a good way to train the brain to ignore the input from your left eye. Hopefully after a while you will be able to get by without it. Not sure if it will be before or after you ditch that 9mm limited gun. Time will tell

 

 

If/when I get serious about chasing points I will undoubtedly get a .40, probably a 2011. Currently I'm only intending to have fun and get better. 

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You can partially close your Left eye which still allows you to see peripherally out of that eye but not focus on anything. This is what I do which allows me to shoot with both eyes "Open" but still maintain a right eye dominance without seeing double sights or targets.

 

I also want to point out that there are several top shooters in the practical shooting sports that fully close their non-dominant eye when shooting. If you can't figure out shooting with both eyes open, embrace the reality that you may simply need to shoot with only your dominant eye open.

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26 minutes ago, CHA-LEE said:

 

I also want to point out that there are several top shooters in the practical shooting sports that fully close their non-dominant eye when shooting. If you can't figure out shooting with both eyes open, embrace the reality that you may simply need to shoot with only your dominant eye open.

 

I didn't know this, I have always assumed most people shot both eyes open and that's just the way it was. I appreciate the help and suggestions from everyone. I have my first match coming up so Ive got lots of things to try! 

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