One eye vs. two?

N

nanney1

New member
Grew up shooting BB and pellet rifles and a bb pistol shooting with my left eye closed.

Now that I'm shooting my Shield, I have been keeping my left eye closed, but I'm dry firing trying to use two eyes.

If I try to sight with both eyes, I can't get a clear fix on the sights or what I'm aiming at. However, if I move my left eye brow down, I can still get a good sight with my right eye. Kind of like The Rock but without raising my right eye brow up:)

I'm not sure this is really any better than one eye closed, but maybe.:confused:
 
You can "train your brain" to use two eyes open if you stick with it for a while. It doesn't take long. It's called neuro-adaptation. As long as your dominant eye is on the same side as your dominant hand you'll adapt fairly quickly. The real problem arises when your dominant eye and dominant hand are different. That won't work very well.
 
Two eyes open are always best with any firearm, any type of sights. But some people struggle with it. Old habits can be hard to break.

If you are struggling your eyes might be cross dominate. Most right handed peoples right eye is the dominate eye. But a few people will be right handed, but left eye dominate. It makes it pretty hard to shoot a rifle or shotgun without closing the off side eye if they are. But since most handguns are more centered it shouldn't be too hard to learn how to shoot a handgun with both open for anyone. Keep practicing with the dry firing.
 
Two eyes open is better for specific reasons but not necessarily target shooting. Though it will make going back and forth from one eye to two more difficult. The reasons it is better are two fold, it gives you a better field of view for action shooting where you are swinging from target to target or where the vision in your dominant eye is not superior to that of having both eyes open.
 
If you can shoot with both eyes open, there are a number of benefits to doing so. If it doesn't work for you (probably due to your dominant eye being on the wrong side compared to your dominant hand or, perhaps due to having eye dominance that is weak) then stick with what works.

My eye dominance is weak and when I get tired, or lighting conditions are poor, I notice that I start to have trouble shooting with both eyes open. When that happens, I just switch to shooting with only one eye open.
 
Cross eye dominant and I struggle if I do not keep both open. I have never been a bullseye shooter but as I get older the more I find trying to get the "perfect" sight picture the less accurate I am
 
I'm right handed my right eye has poor vision , I shoot with both eyes open . Handgun I shoot right handed , rifle I shoot left .Not a problem for me. I could see if both eyes are good and your left eye dominant being a right hand shooter , it would be hard to adjust . Wouldn't the dominant eye always be the aimer.
 
"...clear fix on the sights or..." Should be the front sight. However, the fact that moving an eye brow changes the focus, you might be having some vision issues. When was your last eye test?
"...Handgun I shoot right handed, rifle I shoot left..." The way big, hairy, men were intended to shoot from horseback. But it's your sabre in your right hand and either your carbine or revolver in the left. snicker.
"...the dominant eye always be..." Nope. It's really a depth perception thing.
"...swinging from target to target..." That's eyes on the target and trusting your eye/hand coordination.
 
Wouldn't the dominant eye always be the aimer.
Click to expand...
Yes, ultimately, if you want things to work properly with both eyes open, the dominant eye needs to be the eye that is aligned with the sights and the target.

Otherwise you'll see two sets of sights, and/or two sets of targets and that doesn't work very well.
 
T oheir - swinging from target to target is more than trusting eye hand coordination. Its having better peripheral vision which you get w two eyes open.
 
I am cross eye dominant, right handed, left eyed. I shoot handguns with both eyes open but usually hafta drift a rear sight to the right to hit center of what I am aiming at...

this is also true with tangent or post front, notch rear, iron sights with rifles...with a peep sighted rifle I generally squint my dominant left eye and peer through the rear aperture with my right eye.

Works for me and I shoot well, I shot an awful long time before I was "educated" on the evils of shooting left eyed and right handed and it had never been a handicap. I guess you could say I was blissfully ignorant :) I don't pay any attention to the experts who say I'm doing it wrong, etc....but as usual, opinions vary.
 
>>I only use both eyes with shotguns, clays and birds.<<

Same here, but I can't seem to carry that over to pistol shooting.
 
My grandfather taught me both eyes were better and it’s been that way for over 70 years. Pistols,revolvers or shotguns,all three,both eyes open.
 
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