Anyone Else with Monocular Vision Questioning Their Move to RDS?

[rdtompki]

I love the dot for carry and competition. My index is plenty good enough and training with the dot has really improved the speed of target visual acquisition. I don't have binocular vision so I can't fuse the dot and my left eye visual field. Not an issue for high contrast targets, but when the RDS field of view overlaps a poor contrast target my accuracy takes a hit since I can't discern the outline of the target. This isn't as such a vision issue, it's the result of viewing the target through the limited transmission of the RDS. Wouldn't be an issue with irons of course. I'd be slower with irons but in a different division (Limited versus Open in Steel Challenge). I'd stick with RDS for carry; my use case is such that target contrast would not be an issue.

I'd be interested if anyone is aware of transmission measurements having been performed on any of the popular RDS. In days of old when aircraft head-up displays used cathode ray tubes the combiner coatings could be tuned to the very narrow phosphor emission spikes to improve see-through. Could be done with an RDS at the expense of battery life since you would have to drive the LED emitter quite a bit harder.

[Noah]

I have a very strong dominant eye to the point I have no depth perception and can’t do things like occluded shooting. I perceive the world day to day with both eyes and a unified field of vision but I have a gun or other thing in front of my eyes I’m essentially going monocular even though both eyes are open. I shot pistol RDS 2020-2022 and went back to irons in summer 2022. I learned about small spot target focus and realized I hadn’t been shooting target focused with dots in the past, even though I thought I had. After training small spot target focus with irons for a year and beginning to compete, I tried a dot again this January.
For me, shooting monocular either way, an optic window and housing feels like obscures the target and if the dot brightness is not perfect, it is very hard to see the target spot “past” or “through” the dot itself. Combined with astigmatism, the dot almost always completely covers my “spot” and my monocular vision prevents my off eye from being the primary target focus. This makes it very hard for me not to get locked on to the big glowing ball.

I have an easier time just always keeping my aiming spot in hard focus and bisecting that with the front sight/bracketing it with the rear sight, and for whatever reason, I feel like I get a lot more added awareness and peripheral vision from my off eye when using irons.

I fully recognize that this is not normal for normal binocular vision, and for most people, the benefits I get with irons (easier target focus, better use of both eyes, etc) are the exact benefits they get with a dot.

[Erick Gelhaus]

Have you considered reaching out to Pannone? He has only one eye and is a pretty active optic user.

[rdtompki]

Have you considered reaching out to Pannone? He has only one eye and is a pretty active optic user.

I have not, but based on today's practice I believe the issue is only present in the most severe condition: early morning overcast, mottled sand-colored berm in shadow, sun angle unfavorable, and an otherwise white target diffused to gray due to multiple hits. I'll need to pay more attention during dry fire and just down shift a bit for that sort of target. Of course we can paint our targets in practice, but the matches around here only paint between squads so the 10th gun up the 10" plates will be mostly black. I'm ancient so nothing at stake save for wanting to do my best.