Recently, after shooting with both eyes open for the past 10-15 years, I’ve begun to notice my eyes “fighting” over dominance. I’ll start a string, and a few rds in I’ll notice my eyes starting to pick up the left side of the slide instead of the front sight. I have a slight Rx for distance. Anyone overcome this? Should I start putting tape over my left lens to force my right eye?
I had to get glasses for the first time last year. My vision was always 20/10 in both eyes so when the front sight started getting fuzzy I gave in. My non dominate eye needs less correction than my dominate and I’m having the same issue you are. I’m exploring the possibility of trying mono vision glasses for shooting. I really don’t want specialized glasses for shooting but I want to continue to shoot well. For now I close my non dominate eye and just feel with slower target transitions.
Last edited by MGW; 06-24-2018 at 10:05 PM.
Closing your non-shooting eye for the time it takes to fire a shot or shots isn’t the end of the world.
You can also try doing a partial squint with the non-dominant eye, just enough to lose focus from it and clarify the front sight. With practice (a few dry fire sessions is usually all it takes) you can get to where you lose very little in terms of overall vision while keeping a sharp front sight.Originally Posted by JohnO
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
Thats what I do w/ pistols. Right handed and left eye dominant.
Closing or squinting the non-shooting eye both are virtually equivalent and enable the required visualization of your sights. Don't get wrapped up in a specious argument over the tactical disadvantage of not having both eyes open. You do what is required to establish dominance of the eye you are aligning the sights with and once you fire the weapon you open (un-squint) the other eye. There is no significant time spent with a limited field of vision. If you do not have the ability to accurately shoot a handgun with both eyes open you don't need to go about trying to train yourself to do so.
This is what happened when I first started to shoot both eyes open. Took a few weeks to train the brain so to speak. This also happens to me when I have a large shift in Rx. Went from correction of -1 to -1.75 over a year and boom similar issue. Also happens when I’m cheap and don’t update my contacts rx for a while and shoot glasses only. When I return to contacts vision gets squirrely for a bit.
Dry fire and see if it goes away. If it doesn’t so be it. A good hit is a good hit, be it 2 eyed, one eyed, squinty eyed...
A celebrity trainer recently said regarding the one or two eyed shooting - "See what you need to see". In my mind, I need to see Target, Front Sight, and Rear Sight. I've been fighting the eye dominance issue for the last two years and am finally giving in to it. I'm right-handed and left-eye dominant - but have been using my right (non-dominant) eye. I usually shoot with both eyes open and my dominance difference isn't so great that usually my non-dominant right eye sees what it needs to see for me to get my sight picture / alignment.
Lately my dominant left eye has been interfering with me seeing my rear sight when using my right eye. Instead of seeing the rear sight with my right eye, I see the rear sight off to the right from my dominant left eye. Confused yet? I'm going to bite the bullet and start using my dominant eye, making me a cross-dominant shooter. Using my dominant eye, I'm able to see what I need to see when I need to see it without wrestling with the ghost images from the other eye.
If you need to shoot one-eyed to see what you need to see, it's not the end of the world and according to my doctor, testosterone levels don't rise when shooting with both eyes. A downside to shooting one-eyed in my experience is that it's almost guaranteed that you will blink when the gun fires if one eye is already closed - it being much easier to not blink when both eyes are open. I find that when I blink at the breaking of the shot, I also tend to move the gun and don't follow the front sight through recoil like I should.
Thanks for the quality advice. I will turn in my man card, lower my head as I head into the range tom, and attempt to close my left eye and see what happens. Lots of good points here. I guess was just stuck on the two eyes open concept.
We have only been shooting for may 18 yrs and have been on the web most of that time. I find I can learn a ton on the web but I have also found I have to be careful what I accept as good advice. Can't tell you how many times I have come across the both eyes open thing, 100s? 1000s? But it doesn't work for me so I dropped it the first hour I tried it. Slightly different but related topic. I wear glasses and, over the years, had bifocals, progressive, and now trifocal lenses. One day at home I tried dry firing w/ my computer glasses which have both complete lenses focused at about 30 inches. Dang my sights are perfectly focused and the rest slightly blurred. So now I have a pair of shooting glasses. The entire left lens (dominant eye) is focused at 30 inches and the right lens is a bifocal w/ distance in the top and 30 in focus in the bottom. It took a few minutes explaining to the eye doctor what I wanted and how I came to the conclusion it would work but he understood and made the glasses. What a change. I also picked frames that are wider than my usual glasses to add some protection and, of course, they are made of the hardened plastic.
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