Phoria

[Doc_Glock]

I have phoria when I occlude a red dot sight or irons.

I didn’t know what it was until @GJM (https://pistol-forum.com/member.php?u=410) linked me to this M4C thread that I encourage you to read posts #1 and #19. I had never heard of it in my medical education which isn’t surprising because eyes are kind of their own thing.

https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread.php?34549-The-Effects-of-Phoria-When-Using-the-ACOG-as-an-Occluded-Eye-Gunsight

What this means practically is that if I occlude the dot, I will miss badly to one side or the other depending on which eye I am shooting with. It happens with pistols or rifles but much worse with rifles presumably because the dot is closer to they eye. And it is bad with a rifle: five -feet- to the side at 25 yards and a full foot off at 5.

My non colluded eye has a target focus and the taped dot is easily placed in the center of that target with no double vision or wandering. It’s just way the hell off. Doesn’t matter if I use my dominant or non dominant eye it just misses to one side or the other.

I believe this has something to do with the eyes converging and not wanting to diverge when I target focus due to a lifetime living at convergence for reading, too much screen time, surgery, and front sight focus.

61250

When I missed so badly and honestly felt helpless to do anything about it, it reminded me of being completely inept starting Jiu Jitsu. I literally thought after trying taping the optic to work on my target focus that:

1. I am crazy or
2. Everyone is lying about hitting small targets with the optic occluded

I was experiencing a completely different reality from what everyone described taping the optic.

The good news is it completely corrects itself if I remove the tape from
the optic.

Anyway I am posting to see if anyone else experiences this or has been able to train it out? I would love to hear Gabe White’s input on the matter as he has explored vision so diligently. Or maybe any of you eye docs?

I actually think I could train the eyes to diverge better with diligent work but am unlikely to put in the work necessary.

[Totem Polar]

That’s pretty trippy. You were correct about reading post 19; that’s interesting stuff that I didn’t even know existed.

[Lex Luthier]

Subscribed.

I have life-long eye issues much like those described in #19 post in the M4C thread, and am interested in learning better ways to deal with them. Have got either a red dot, holographic sight, prism scope, or
fixed power scope coming for the carbine. (shoutout to NH Shooter)
In the last year I have gone to full time use of glasses (Have used computer, then reading glasses since about 2002) and had several surgeries in childhood to try and repair problems with dominance and strabismus. I am mostly left eye dominant.

[NH Shooter]

Subscribed.

I have life-long eye issues much like those described in #19 post in the M4C thread, and am interested in learning better ways to deal with them. Have got either a red dot, holographic sight, prism scope, or
fixed power scope coming for the carbine. (shoutout to NH Shooter)


I've had myopia all of my life, quite severely in my younger years, and over the last 15 years or so presbyopia on top of it. But as is often the case, my myopia has lessened considerably considerably as I have aged to the point that I could easily get through life without any corrective lenses for the myopia. In some strange mix of the two I no longer need corrective lenses for reading, and I can target-focus while keeping the sights sharp shooting handguns. I do not suffer from phoria.

Magnified (or prismatic) optic with adjustable diopter have been the best for my vision shooting rifles, with no corrective lenses in between.

[Cory]

This makes me wonder about the Bindon Aiming Concept that ACOGs often talk about in advertising. Perhaps it doesn't act the same because you can stil sorta see the target, but its the same super imposed type of sight picture.

[Doc_Glock]

This makes me wonder about the Bindon Aiming Concept that ACOGs often talk about in advertising. Perhaps it doesn't act the same because you can stil sorta see the target, but its the same super imposed type of sight picture.

Technically the BAC was used for a moving object, both eyes open allowing one to track it.

I believe phoria can be lessened by firing rapidly on target acquisition as the longer the dot is in front of the eye, the more one loses target focus and the more the dot appears to be moving then stabilizing laterally.

I need to work with a lot more in dry fire but I am pretty certain that my target focus is not as strong as it could be and that explains the convergence of the eyes. Or I simply have the weird ability to focus at a distance while still having my eyes converged as if they are focusing on the front sight up close.

The eyes should converge only when focusing close in then relax and become more parallel when looking to the distance. In my case it appears the closer converged position is the more comfortable place for they eyes to land. Which makes a hell of a lot of sense given how much of my life has been buried in a book.

[Eyesquared]

Technically the BAC was used for a moving object, both eyes open allowing one to track it.

I believe phoria can be lessened by firing rapidly on target acquisition as the longer the dot is in front of the eye, the more one loses target focus and the more the dot appears to be moving then stabilizing laterally.

I need to work with a lot more in dry fire but I am pretty certain that my target focus is not as strong as it could be and that explains the convergence of the eyes. Or I simply have the weird ability to focus at a distance while still having my eyes converged as if they are focusing on the front sight up close.

The eyes should converge only when focusing close in then relax and become more parallel when looking to the distance. In my case it appears the closer converged position is the more comfortable place for they eyes to land. Which makes a hell of a lot of sense given how much of my life has been buried in a book.
Not sure if you read what Mr. White posted about vision years back but generally people can converge their eyes and focus at different distances. When I shoot irons I generally converge my eyes on the target but whether I am focused on the target or front sight depends on target difficulty. In shooting it's hard to imagine a situation where it's important to converge close but focus far, but I don't think there's any biological reason it can't be done.

I wonder if you have something going on with your eyes causing this phoria or if this is a trained response that could be reversed.

[sickeness]

Yes, I as well absolutely have this issue as well.
It took me a long time to figure it out as it is not often discussed online.
I took a class with a well known instructor who kept telling me that my issue was trigger pull even though I knew it wasn't. After self diagnosing this I was able to train myself out of it to become proficient.

IMO this topic needs to be addressed by anyone teaching the dot.

[Archer1440]

I don’t have this at all, but I’m wondering, do you wear glasses? If so I could see where a difference in prescription from one side to another, or lens shape difference, or edge distortion, could cause it.

Perhaps a bit of strabismus? Some forms respond well to vision exercises.

[sickeness]

I don’t have this at all, but I’m wondering, do you wear glasses? If so I could see where a difference in prescription from one side to another, or lens shape difference, or edge distortion, could cause it.

Perhaps a bit of strabismus? Some forms respond well to vision exercises.

I do wear glasses.
The way it was explained to me: My right eye is only very slightly dominant over my left eye, the slight distortion experienced when looking through an RDS is enough to kick my left eye into dominance and hence seeing a double target.

[Doc_Glock]

Mr_White

[sickeness]

Another issue that may be contributing to this that is not often discussed: Absolute co-witness iron sights.
If your iron sights are covering up a portion of the dot when your non-dominant eye is closed, there are certain angles in which, with both eyes open, the post will cover up the target as seen on presentation. As a result you will be shooting at a vision of the target that is produced by your non-dominant eye.

[FreedomFries]

Reviving this thread because it seemed like the closest to the issue I am having.

I had strabismus in childhood and had surgery on both eyes twice to correct this. I am also nearsighted in both eyes, worse in the right, but at least 20/20 in each eye with corrective lenses. Due to surgical correction, I can align my eyes correctly when I am looking at something, but when I am tired I may exhibit intermittent exotropia, where my right eye starts to point outwards. My right eye also exhibits exophoria, where if I have the red dot or even iron sights in front of my face, the binocular vision is disrupted and my right eye will wander outward. The end sight picture that I have is basically like the picture I have attached. The right eye's image will not merge correctly and will appear to the left of the left eye's image. I have tried occluded aiming and various techniques to practice merging the images together, but that will not realistically happen due to my eye issues. The end result is that I have to look through the window of the optic with my left eye and try to ignore the input from the right eye for aiming (although I can still get some useful background information from it).

This is not just with a pistol optic, but also with a red dot or ACOG on a rifle, except I am forced to use my right eye and try to ignore the unmerged image from the left eye. With a long gun, I tend to prefer an optic with a larger window like an EOTech and do not like using an Aimpoint Micro.

Does anyone else have a similar issue? I am guessing that I will not be able to achieve the same speed with a dot that someone who can fully target focus can. I am starting to question whether the benefits of using a dot are limited to the point where I should be using irons again. Luckily for me, the majority of my shooting is now without any time pressure.

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