TargetTalk

I have always shot with my naked eye but it was recommended to me that I shooting with different color filters for different environments. I mostly shoot smallbore indoors 50 ft with fair lighting (not the best but I can see the target) but I started shooting outdoors at 100 yards and found the sun to be straining on my eyes. I have a standard anschutz adjustable aperture but was looking into getting one with colors and polarized like this one:

http://champchoice.com/store/Main.aspx? ... &item=9565

Would this be a smart purchase? I am doing my best to avoid shooting glasses as I sweat a ton and they always fog up on me. I am curious if there is there a color that will help with the dim indoors?

Thanks for any advice.

That's not a bad choice, but if all you want are color filters, I would check out http://champchoice.com/store/Main.aspx? ... &item=9560 instead. I had the polarizer/color combo for quite some time, but found that I never used the polarizer, so when it came time to replace the iris I just got colors. In addition to being cheaper, it's also shorter, so you have more room to play with rear sight position.

As for using a filter indoors, I would recommend against it; filters are just going to decrease the amount of light reaching your eye. If you're already straining, a filter will only make it worse. If you ARE straining, I would recommend opening your rear iris a bit (0.1-0.3mm) and seeing how that does for you. As with any change, give it ample training time before deciding whether to keep it.

More compact, and less money still...

http://www.champchoice.com/store/Main.a ... s&item=508

Personally I find a yellow filter to work well with the fluorescent lighting fitted at many indoor ranges. Yes a filter does reduce the light that enters your eye, but yellow filters out the bits that you don't really use, and it enhances the contrast between the target/sights and background.

However not everyone likes yellow filters.

As noted below opening the iris on indoor ranges will allow more light through to your eye. If you are worried about losing focus on the foresight, you might want to get a prescription lens for shooting. Typically +0.5 to your distance prescription will give a good sharp foresight and visible target without a super-small rearsight aperture.

As for shooting outdoors, yes it is a shock after shooting indoors. Firstly, get a hat if you don't have one. You want something with a floppy brim or peak that will shade the rearsight and your eyes, but not catch on the rearsight and fall off. Remember to use your aperture to tweak the sight picture. Filters are good too - there is no worry about not having enough light when it's too bright.

You may also want to try a difference foresight element. The extra light will make the gap between the target and foresight ring brighter, so the target appears smaller.

In my case, it was like when I shot with regular glasses, I did use orange/red filter, and this did just great job. I bought simple Varga's glasses and try orange/red... with more than no success. In fact, I was not able to shoot. Hard to describe - I just didn't see anything. Now I play just with polariser or gray and aperture size.
The problem with colour filters and glassess, especially thick (wearing one, not sure what about thinner, I mean smaller corrections) is if they're not placed correctly, they give chromatic distortion. Add to this yellow or blue filter, and you may not be sure what and where you exactly see.

Yellow I find is quite good for days with low contrast/flat light.

When you reduce shooting to the calculation of the optical physics, there are three elements to consider:

1. Depth of field. While your eye only has one mathematical focal point, in practice there is a range of distance in which everything appears in focus because the amount of blur is less than the eye can resolve. The size of this depth of field is determined by aperture size, where a smaller aperture gives a bigger depth of field. The limitatioin is that the size of the opening determines how much light gets through, so if you go too small, especially in dim conditions, you start to dim the sight picture.
2. Focal point. Where you are focused determines the center of your depth of field. Ideally, you want your depth of field centered between the target and the sight, so the target just falls in the far edge of your depth of field, at the same time as your sight falls in the near edge of your depth of field. This focal distance is called the hyperfocal distance of the front sight. You can adjust your focus by exerting the eye muscle (if you are young), or by adding a slight positive diopter lens. The normal human eye, or the corrected human eye, will focus at infinity if the eye is relaxed. The shift from infinity to the hyperfocal distance is accomplished by adding a +0.50 diopter lens for long sight radius, small bore, M1/M14, palma, etc, or by adding +0.75 diopter for short sight radius, like AR15, or pistol. If you do not need distance correction, you would just get a +0.50 lens, if you do need distance correction, you would simply add +0.50 to your distance prescription, and get that lens.
3. Color. Color is a two edged sword, because any color reduces the amount of light getting through. So if you use a color filter, you need to increase your aperture size to let in more light, which means you have to sacrifice depth of field and focus. Color filters block the opposite color. UV light, which is just on the edge of the blue spectrum, is blocked by a yellow filter (yellow is the opposite of blue). Polycarbonate (ie safety glasses) blocks 99+% of UV up to about 390 nm, just by its chemical nature. However UV goes up to about 400nm, so there is just a little bit that gets through. So if you are shooting where the light source has a strong UV component, like sunlight, or fluorescent lighting, pale yellow can help. Also, if you are hunting with a green foliage background, a light pink/vermillion lens (red is the opposite of green) can help.

I have not found anything in literature that explains a benefit of any other color for shooters. I do know there are certain types of color blindness that need certain colors, but that is getting beyond my expertise.

Bottom line, for target shooting, get a +0.50 diopter, and reduce your aperture size are the two big steps to getting a good sight picture, possibly a pale yellow filter, though that is a lesser issue.