Left eye shooting

[cenelson]

I took a BB in the right eye when I was a kid. It doesn't work all that well anymore. I've always used the right eye anyway cause it's just what has felt right. Now whenever I shoot manual focus I try to left eye it. I just cant seem to do it if I am rushing but if the camera is on a tripod and I have time to compose I always get better results left eyed. I just need to use auto focus and the right eye for sports type stuff. Just can't get the hang of the left eye. As far as squinting I do it with either eye. Gotta try to leave the right one open...

:eek:

[grizzz]

Ouch.... Best damn shot my brother ever made. I was in a barn on the second level and he sent it right up the barrel of my gun not 3 seconds after I had just drilled him. It's OK though I ran him over with my car a few years later but that is another story. Just think, my parents had 4 sons and we were considered the good ones .

[cenelson]

Bear with me, if you will.

When I was young, my father - a cop - was my hero. I was turning 5, if I recall correctly, when my old man came home with one of those Red Ryder units, for me.

I had no idea it was coming, totally out of the blue. Well, a short primer on how to sight it and what not to point it at, and I was out the door. Killed my first bird within an hour. Many more would follow that one. I was something of a marksman. Sad when I look back; the birds committed no crimes.

At any rate, any who was lucky enough to own one of those old Daisy BB guns with the twist-caps over the ends, covering the loading tubes, remembers that those things would become jam-prone. To correct that when it occurred, you pointed the business end at the ground or out into the wild open and you gave the end-cap a twist. Usually, the BB would then fire. Not sure what would cause it to happen tho.

Well, my old man was attempting to remedy a jam for me one afternoon and I had interrupted his work to do it; absentmindly, he seized the gun and went to twisting at the cap - with his palm flat over the end of the barrel.

POP!

Any who knows me knows I'm salty, meaning I've got a bit of a foul tongue on me depending on my mood and company. I learned most of my good words that afternoon.

My dad threw the BB gun to the deck, and in his palm was a perfectly round entry point where the BB had gone in.

Now, knowing that my BBs made holes in birds and killed them dead, I had a bad feeling my old man was now, similarly, mortally wounded. But he just stood there, cursing Daisy and her sonuvabitchin friend Little Red Rider too, and he massaged that palm of his, continually. Moments dragged on. And then - POP! - out came the copper BB!

Boy howdy! I was thinking, My dad's the toughest guy in the world! I bet he's the best policeman ever!

And in reality, my old man was and to some extent remains a tough act. He's long past cop-dom, but old soldiers of the force remembered him and his acts of courage long past his leaving the PD.

Unfortunately, he was never much a father, which I needed more than a cop. In fact, I think I miss that BB gun and all the long summer days spent with it, chasing cattle birds, mocking birds, cardinals, blue jays, stray dogs, and my brother (now and again).

The End.

C.

[Zen Librarian]

I'm right-handed/left-eyed, too! It would be totally unnatural not to use my left eye, I think. I have astigmatism in my right eye so I'd need a corrective lens anyway, I think. I'm a left eye archer* as well.
 
*No animals have ever been harmed, maimed or otherwise injured in my archery endeavors.
 
:2yippee:

[Todd G]

Well, Jack, I'm a leftie too, but shoot right-eyed exclusively.  Except for TLR's which I shoot both-eyed.  Unless I use the flip up magnifier, which I then look into right-eyed.  But actually, since I most often use standard focal length lenses on 35mm, I do keep keep both eyes open.

And if we all think about it a minute, we all know the only true way, that used by the acknowledged photographic masters, is to mount your 8x10 on a tripod, compose, focus, then stand beside the camera with both eyes open as you trip the shutter with a cable release.   At least that's the pose I've seen in portraits of Ansel Adams, and Edward Weston and others.

[Philip]

Is there actually any connection between handedness and eyedness?  I don't think so.  I am decidedly right-handed (and -footed) and just as decidedly left-eyed. No damage to my right eye, just a definite preference for taking pictures with my left.  I've read that some left-eyed people try to be physically more comfortable and force themselves to become right-eyed, but I wouldn't bother.  I can _see_ clearly enough with my right eye, but I just cannot compose ("see the picture") with it.  My left eye does that job much better. And, of course, I suppose there's a left brain / right brain thing going on there.

I'm lucky my nose bends that direction so I can hold cameras to my left eye.
But I do wish that one of my hundred or so cameras was a leftie...

.
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[Wimpler]

If I were a left eyes person (never really tried, does not seem natural) I would probably use an exakta camera.  It has the viewfinder in the center but the film advance and shutter release button are both on the left side.

[Tom Hildreth]

I'm right-eyed, left-handed. I've learned to photograph with both eyes open when I feel squinting strain coming on in the left eye, and I seem to have little trouble concentrating on the right eye when doing so.
 
One place where I failed at any sort of left-right dexterity was during several days M-16 combat training. We had to take firing positions on the left side of a building in one scenario, and were told to shoot left eyed so as not to expose ourselves. I had never had a weapon on my left shoulder, and had never tried to fire with my left eye. Good thing it was training, I was worthless at it.