Vision and Shooting

[Steve.H]

As I've grown older, I have found that when looking down my gun the sight is clear, the actual target is out of focus.

I have been looking for solutions to this problem for years, and have plenty of thoughts on the subject. I know I'm not alone in the frustration I found relying on bifocals or progressive glasses at the range. They caused distortion and blurriness and forced me to move my head while aiming at the target.

What experiences have you all had? I would love to hear more about the vision solutions other older shooters have found, as well.

-Steve

 

[jenlynn724]

The front sight should be in focus, while the target should be out of focus.. I might be misunderstanding what you are asking though...

 

[Supermoto]

Put a red dot on your gun, then everything is in focus. Or adjust you glasses so your front sight is in focus or use a target focus. or adjust your glasses so your master eye is focused for the front site and your other eye for the target.. it depends on what type of shooting you are doing

 

[JGreen]

I swear by the CVS 1.5 reading glasses.

 

[milktree]

http://www.eyepalusa.com/

Seriously, they work. It's pretty remarkable.

 

[Rob Boudrie]

Seriously, they work. It's pretty remarkable.

It depends on the type of shooting. This is practical for bullseye (we're talking about a small aperature pinhole lens), but not for situations where speed is of the essence (USPSA, Steel, IDPA, bowling pins, etc.)

What experiences have you all had? I would love to hear more about the vision solutions other older shooters have found, as well.

I have a set of shooting glasses made with the right eye focusing a bit beyond the front sight, but still keeping the front sight within the range where I can easily focus. Pushing the focus forward a bit reduces distance blur. The left eye was corrected to the same distance minus .0.25 to give a slight improvement in two eye distance vision without creating a big imbalance between the lenses.

Since my Rx is about -5, I got industrial safety glasses with a side shield since wrap-arounds don't do well in a heavy RX, and did not want an insert system with 4 optical surfaces to get dirty instead of 2.

 

[Bill Nance]

As I've grown older, I have found that when looking down my gun the sight is clear, the actual target is out of focus.

I have been looking for solutions to this problem for years, and have plenty of thoughts on the subject. I know I'm not alone in the frustration I found relying on bifocals or progressive glasses at the range. They caused distortion and blurriness and forced me to move my head while aiming at the target.

What experiences have you all had? I would love to hear more about the vision solutions other older shooters have found, as well.

-Steve

Exact same problem here. I will be eagerly awaiting useful advice since 100 yard targets are just faint blurs to me at this point.

 

[Steve.H]

Thanks for all your feedback. As someone in the eye care profession, I find this all very interesting.

My friend Sam Wortham, who is an award winning champion shooter, has these same vision problems. He has been working with a new technology, adjustable-focus glasses, and has had a lot of luck with them recently. You can read about his experience here.

Would you consider trying technology like this?

 

[R1ch]

Oh so you're here to market this new product, why didn't you just say so in the first place! LOL That's probably why you got the sight issue backwards, most people complain they can see the target clearly, but the front sight is out of focus (which is the real issue).

I checked out the website. Neat technology.

I'm not crazy about the styling, and I don't see any safety glasses that would protect well for shooting and at about $700 (or more) they are pricey.

However it's a great technology you (they?) have developed!

I started with those terrible COKE BOTTLE BOTTOM glasses everyone knows about. Then years ago I had Lasik surgery. Wow that was great! Of course, now I've gotten older and have the Presbyopia problem! For a while I was using off the shelf reading glasses, but then I decided to touch up my vision and get some progressives so I wasn't always leaving my reading glasses around. So I'm back to wearing glasses again.

For shooting I have a pair of reading glasses that I use to correct my vision for the front sight. These are a cheap way of solving this problem ($10 to $25).

I'd love to try your new technology glasses, but not at $700!

When I can do it via my local eye doc. so my insurance can cover most of the cost, I may not be very interested. Since my current lenses are new, I have to wait a year before I can get a new set. When I do, I'll have my local doc. look into these for me.

 

[b79holmes]

As I've grown older, I have found that when looking down my gun the sight is clear, the actual target is out of focus.

'Technically' this has always been true since the day you were born.
It's just that when you are young your eye can change focus distances very fast.
As we get older everything slows down, including how fast your eye can change focal planes.

I just use a target with a bigger bulls-eye.

Bill

 

[wannabmudn]

I have had eye problems all my life. I haven't had depth perception since I was 19. My right eye hemorraged about 10 years ago, leaving me with blurry 20/50 vision in that eye. I wear a +17.5 contact in my left eye, correcting to 20/30. On top of that I have an astigmatism.

I shoot pistol right hand left eye, and rifle right hand right eye. I don't use a scope for either. I do prefer sights with a white dot when shooting at shoot n see's, but other than that there isn't much that I do differently than most shooters. I make sure I use all my senses when shooting, and my others do a pretty good job making up for what I lack in eye sight. If you are only shooting to 100 yards, I don't see any reason why one can't spend a bit more time practicing and learn to adapt.

If you prefer to use a scope, choose one with either a single dot or fine cross hairs. More junk in the scope means more crap to distort what you're trying to focus on.

 

[TomH]

You can't possibly see both the front sight and the target focused at the same time. One will always be fuzzy. Good news, it isn't that you're older!