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Photography Question 

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Overcoming eye strain.


Closing one eye and looking through the eyepiece is quite strenuous.

Especially, when I look through the viewfinder to focus in difficult situations for a long time, my eyes get strained and I get a blur vision for few minutes.

Any suggestions to overcome or reduce this problem?


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December 22, 2000

 

John A. Lind
  Hi,
Several ideas come to mind.

(1) Try using your other eye if possible. In most people, one eye is "stronger" than the other. This means the other, weaker one moves to adjust its parallax to it. If you are using the weaker one, this could be at least part of your fatigue.

(2) If you wear prescription corrective lenses (glasses) but are not using them with the camera, try getting a dioptric correction lens made. Most cameras allow the use of an eyecup that slides over a slots on the side of the viewfinder. Most eyecups have a threaded ring inside them which allows putting a small round corrective lens in the eyecup. This can be a big help in focusing under low light and for long periods. This works well for near-sighted and far-sighted corrections. Correction for things that are orientation dependent such as astigmatism is not usually possible. If an astigmatism corrected lens is mounted to the viewfinder in the correct orientation for holding the camera body horizontally, as soon as you turn the camera body vertical, the astigmatism problem will be even worse. I wear glasses, but do not use them with my cameras. One bought more recently has dioptric correction adjustment built in to the viewfinder and I have eyecups with corrective lenses in them for two others. Got the eyecups with corrective lenses after using the body with its own adjustment. It made a world of difference in focusing quickly, accurately and will less eye strain. Your optician should be able to make a corrective lens if you provide the eyecup. Some camera manufacturers make eyecups for specific camera models and dioptric lenses for them. If this is the case, all you need to provide to the camera dealer or manufacturer is what correction you need in diopters.

(3) If you are about 40 or older, you could also be in need of vision correction even if you don't wear glasses otherwise. 40 seems to be the magic age for reading glasses because the eye can no longer focus as closely any more (the lens on the eye starts to harden). It is normal human aging that does this. Depending on your specific camera, the viewfinder optics place the effective distance of the image you see through it a few feet in front of you, even if you have focused the lens on infinity.

(4) If none of the above apply to your situation, then you might want to try leaving both eyes open and experiment with each eye to find which is the "strong" one. You can eventually train your eyes (brain) to use one, but not the other when using your camera. Some photographers do this, especially when using an SLR and panning with moving objects. The viewfinder on an SLR goes black for about 1/50th to 1/30th second when the shutter is released, losing sight of the subject unless both eyes are open.

Hope this helps some.
-- John


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December 31, 2000

 
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