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training red dot with the front covered?


AverageJoeShooting

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Turn your dot brightness down. Most of the time when people have "Dot focus" issues its because their dot brightness is jacked up so high that you literally CAN'T focus on anything else. To me the perfect dot brightness is low enough that I can almost see targets through it. This is especially important when shooting aggressively and the dot is streaking across the glass.

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I also want to point out that covering the front of the glass is restricting your visual input for your dominant eye. This game is all about processing visual inputs and I am not going to purposefully limit my visual input. Especially when the dot focus issue can be eliminated by using the proper dot brightness.

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17 minutes ago, CHA-LEE said:

I also want to point out that covering the front of the glass is restricting your visual input for your dominant eye. This game is all about processing visual inputs and I am not going to purposefully limit my visual input. Especially when the dot focus issue can be eliminated by using the proper dot brightness.

Like what JJ said in an interview where he mentioned talking to other dot shooters.  "Why the f$%k would I want to cover my dot"  Information is power and visual information for us even more so.

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1 hour ago, CHA-LEE said:

Turn your dot brightness down. Most of the time when people have "Dot focus" issues its because their dot brightness is jacked up so high that you literally CAN'T focus on anything else. To me the perfect dot brightness is low enough that I can almost see targets through it. This is especially important when shooting aggressively and the dot is streaking across the glass.

^^This is great advice.  Turning down the dot really helped me to stop fixating on it.

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Charlie in here throwing down truths as usual. 
 

I’m going to be more blunt. 
Covering your RDS lens as a training aid or shooting aid is stupid. Don’t do it. Don’t purposefully limit your visual input/feedback. 

 

If you’ve tried it and you think it helps it’s most likely placebo or confirmation bias. Turn your dot down, swap to a smaller dot, or use some training techniques to develop your focus. Stop obscuring your vision. 
 

My biggest gripe with this fad, is that many times it’s causing people to “inspect” an issue into their shooting that isn’t actually there. Unlike irons, shooting a dot is pretty darn intuitive… if you allow it to be. 

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I turn mine down low to keep it from starbursting like a supernova.  I had tri focal lense replacement and I have gone to a slideride.  I started ipsc open this year and even put a dot on my revolver (for ICORE). First icore match of 2021 wasn’t until September and it clicked.  The slideride dot at full blast in full sun was SHARP.  So I put them on both my open guns (was using rts2’s) and took the RTS2’s and just put them on my P320 legions.  Mainly for outdoor winter practice, which turns out was good idea as my open gun hates the cold. The 2 matches this sat were an exercise in keeping the gun and mags warm.

 

 

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Putting tape on the lens does have its merits.

  • It mitigates lens flare which might show up as false dots.
  • If the shooter isn't well disciplined in target focus (not only from dot brightness, but dot movement), then the shooter immediately knows that there's something to correct.

From my experience, it was more efficient to learn and teach others with a taped optic as there's a difference in believing you're target focused versus actually being so. The only downside in my opinion is if the line of sight from the open eye to the target gets blocked.

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if i turn the dot down i started losing the dot

i just turn it on full blast and cover the front. 

accomplishes the same end goal

 

now im sure theres something to be said about more practice or something like that with a lower dot....but im pretty sure ive made clear that i basically do no practice at all and show up to all matches and just shoot like i dont give a s#!t...because i dont

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7 hours ago, AverageJoeShooting said:

if i turn the dot down i started losing the dot

i just turn it on full blast and cover the front. 

accomplishes the same end goal

 

now im sure theres something to be said about more practice or something like that with a lower dot....but im pretty sure ive made clear that i basically do no practice at all and show up to all matches and just shoot like i dont give a s#!t...because i dont

 

So you are basically confirming that covering the glass is for shooters who both don't practice and also don't care about their performance.

 

For everyone else that actually practices and cares about their performance, stop using the crutch of covering the glass. Put in the work to learn how to use your equipment properly. If you need to cover the glass to prove/disprove your ability to stay target focused, go for it. But that should be a temporary scenario to confirm you are succeeding or failing at shooting a red dot gun properly.

 

If you picked a red dot product (SRO for example) that produces "Double Dot" scenarios in certain lighting conditions, then YOU ARE USING THE WRONG TOOL for the job. Use the correct red dot product that doesn't screw you over due to a poor design. Yes, you may have to throw a $500 sight in the trash because it sucks. Some lessons are more expensive than others.

Edited by CHA-LEE
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20 minutes ago, CHA-LEE said:

 

So you are basically confirming that covering the glass is for shooters who both don't practice and also don't care about their performance.

 

For everyone else that actually practices and cares about their performance, stop using the crutch of covering the glass. Put in the work to learn how to use your equipment properly. If you need to cover the glass to prove/disprove your ability to stay target focused, go for it. But that should be a temporary scenario to confirm you are succeeding or failing at shooting a red dot gun properly.

 

we have cha-lee and JJ in one corner, and yong lee and hwansik in the other corner....... this suggests to me that perhaps it's not an entirely clearcut issue with only 1 correct approach. Or maybe the corners aren't clearly defined.....

 

for sure, there is no doubt for me that in certain high glare situations covering the front of the dot helps. One of our pits at nampa faces straight into the sun in the morning. It's very challenging to see much of anything without some way of reducing the glare. making a little sunshade out of tape also works, but doesn't seem to work any *better* than just covering the dot for that stage if I have to shoot it first or second stage.

 

Also for sure, there is no doubt for me that doing dryfire with the dot taped over is helping me get used to more target-focused shooting (it's also helping my iron sights shooting, btw), but except for the occasional stage straight into the sun, I wouldn't do it for a match.

 

fwiw, I shoot with yong lee pretty regularly. I have never actually observed him with tape over his dot, or heard him say anything about it, but maybe I just wasn't paying attention.

Edited by motosapiens
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1 hour ago, CHA-LEE said:

 

If you picked a red dot product (SRO for example) that produces "Double Dot" scenarios in certain lighting conditions, then YOU ARE USING THE WRONG TOOL for the job. Use the correct red dot product that doesn't screw you over due to a poor design. Yes, you may have to throw a $500 sight in the trash because it sucks. Some lessons are more expensive than others.

 

If only it were that simple. It seems like the SRO is the dot that holds up the best. One could argue if you use anything else when it breaks it'll be because you're using the wrong tool for the job. 

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3 hours ago, CHA-LEE said:

 

So you are basically confirming that covering the glass is for shooters who both don't practice and also don't care about their performance.

 

For everyone else that actually practices and cares about their performance, stop using the crutch of covering the glass. Put in the work to learn how to use your equipment properly. If you need to cover the glass to prove/disprove your ability to stay target focused, go for it. But that should be a temporary scenario to confirm you are succeeding or failing at shooting a red dot gun properly.

 

If you picked a red dot product (SRO for example) that produces "Double Dot" scenarios in certain lighting conditions, then YOU ARE USING THE WRONG TOOL for the job. Use the correct red dot product that doesn't screw you over due to a poor design. Yes, you may have to throw a $500 sight in the trash because it sucks. Some lessons are more expensive than others.

I mean crutch or not we both made gm in 18 months

 

If you learn to shoot with the dot covered, then it's not any more or less of a crutch. You simply learn to shoot that way.

It's the same as people who shoot with one finger covering the trigger guard. 

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I'm with moto.  At one SCSA club all bays face East.  At a certain time in the morning all dots get a diagonal red streak from top left to bottom right.  There is still only one dot, and you can see to shoot.  However, it's distracting.  Even the Slideride with GR hood has the problem.  Taping the dot helps.

 

I have mixed feelings about shooting with the dot covered.  It appears the targets are farther away.  Neither or my eyes see the same image.  The right images is larger and closer.  The left is sharper, smaller and farther.  With both eyes open my brain forms an image in between.  I don't have a dominant eye.

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9 hours ago, Racinready300ex said:

 

If only it were that simple. It seems like the SRO is the dot that holds up the best. One could argue if you use anything else when it breaks it'll be because you're using the wrong tool for the job. 

 

Everyone I know at our club has ditched the SROs. The double dot is an issue. So far the FTP Alpha 3 and Romeo 3's have been holding up to slide ride.

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11 hours ago, motosapiens said:

Also for sure, there is no doubt for me that doing dryfire with the dot taped over is helping me get used to more target-focused shooting (it's also helping my iron sights shooting, btw), but except for the occasional stage straight into the sun, I wouldn't do it for a match.

I’m in the process of learning the dot and have been using the tape over the front of the optic. I’ve used it in training (dry fire and some live fire), but wouldn’t do it in a match either. I have noticed the same thing as doing this work has helped my iron sight shooting too. I’ve always been such a strongly front sight focused shooter I really had a tough time going more target focused with the dot just turned down. 

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How is this giant struggle to look at the target just now raising its head after Open shooters have been shooting dots for decades? 


It literally used to be one of the allures of Open. “I can just look at the target now! It’s so much easier and faster!” Focus struggles (with a rds) never used to be much of a talking point around here (and lord knows EVERYTHING gets harped on here). I honestly cannot remember the last time an Open shooter said to me “I’m really struggling with focusing on the dot too much”. But lately, it seems like every third CO shooter I run into has that complaint.  
 

I seriously think this “focus” fad is causing people to make mountains out of mole hills, and in some cases causing people to try and “correct” how THEIR eyes and brain perceive things, when it isn’t actually an issue. 
 

Brian famously said “see what you need to see”. I think that may hold more water now than ever. 

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8 hours ago, mrvip27 said:

 

Everyone I know at our club has ditched the SROs. The double dot is an issue. So far the FTP Alpha 3 and Romeo 3's have been holding up to slide ride.

 

Everyone I know with a Sig dot broke them, myself included. Maybe they've fixed them but I wont hold my breath. Luckily none of the ranges in this area cause the double dot problem. 

 

7 hours ago, Ssanders224 said:

How is this giant struggle to look at the target just now raising its head after Open shooters have been shooting dots for decades? 


It literally used to be one of the allures of Open. “I can just look at the target now! It’s so much easier and faster!” Focus struggles (with a rds) never used to be much of a talking point around here (and lord knows EVERYTHING gets harped on here). I honestly cannot remember the last time an Open shooter said to me “I’m really struggling with focusing on the dot too much”. But lately, it seems like every third CO shooter I run into has that complaint.  
 

I seriously think this “focus” fad is causing people to make mountains out of mole hills, and in some cases causing people to try and “correct” how THEIR eyes and brain perceive things, when it isn’t actually an issue. 
 

Brian famously said “see what you need to see”. I think that may hold more water now than ever. 

 

Could some of that be just because more people are shooting CO now? Or maybe shooters in general are better and training techniques have improved. There are more instructors out there training people now and noticing the problems their students are having. 

 

It's even possible the people that sucked at open where focusing on the dot back then and didn't know it. 

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I have dots on all my pistols except one.  Most of them are mounted to the slide.  Some directly attached to the slide in a rear scallop cut; others in dovetail mounts.  My three Open guns all wear frame mounted dots.  I keep the dot brightness on all of them as low as practical.

 

With a frame mounted dot you have essentially an uninterrupted field of view.  So it is easy to focus on the target; not the dot.  The closer the sight gets to the bore, the more difficult that becomes.  It is by no means impossible.  It is just harder, because you have this big blob of a slide blocking your field of view.  You have to learn to see the target(s) with your left eye while superimposing the dot on the target with your right.  Reverse if you are a lefty.

 

I shoot with a lot of ex-Prod shooters who went CO.  Some of them got a lot faster.  Several of them play find the dot after the draw.  One Open shooter went back to Limited, because he said it is easier to aim.  I take his point.  If I could still see a front sight, I'd be shooting Limited.

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10 hours ago, Ssanders224 said:

How is this giant struggle to look at the target just now raising its head after Open shooters have been shooting dots for decades? 

 

 

because i've never shot open, and never want to shoot open, and think open guns are loud, fragile and overpriced. OTOH, CO appeals to me since it is based on actual duty/carry equipment. I suspect I'm not the only one with years of iron sight experience and training who is now interested in getting better with a dot.

 

Most of the open shooters I know switched to open before they ever got good with irons. Many switched because they *couldn't* get good with irons (or didn't feel like practicing, lol). OTOH, many of the people switching now are pretty good with irons and have been practicing for a long time with irons, so instead of being instantly faster, there is a bit of a regression at first. I think people are brainstorming and practicing to try to get over that.

 

Edited by motosapiens
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41 minutes ago, motosapiens said:

 so instead of being instantly faster, there is a bit of a regression at first. 

 

 

I do think this is a fallacy that gets perpetuated too much.... That a dot is going to magically make you a "better/faster" shooter. People swap and end up panicking because it's not "easy" like its "supposed" to be. Which in-turn, kind of causes some to grasp at magic solutions. Kind of like when everyone thought that flipping a Cmore on it's side was the magic wand for losing the dot. 

 

Look at what you want to shoot with both eyes, and put the dot on it. This always has been, and still is the joy of RDS's. No focus shifting needed. If you think you may be giving to dot too much attention, work on it. Or MAYBE, sometimes seeing things in a way that works for your brain, might be worth exploiting. 

Edited by Ssanders224
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