Old Eyes

Kevin Caulfield · Mar 17, 2019

I've posted this in the B&W Film forum because that's mostly what I do.

Anyway, as of about two or three days ago I've noticed my close-up vision has got worse. Today I was doing a shoot in the darkroom and this was the first time I've had to actually use reading glasses to see the camera aperture settings etc.

I know this happens to most of us but it still comes as a bit of a shock. My wife is a couple of years younger than me and it happened to her about a year or two ago.

So now I suppose I'll have to get used to wearing glasses whilst using a camera. I guess it could be worse.

So how did you cope with deteriorating vision?

jimjm · Mar 17, 2019

For 35mm bodies, I've installed diopter eyepieces if the body doesn't already have an adjustable diopter.
With medium-format cameras like Rolleiflex or Bronica SQ with waist-level finders, the pop-up magnifier works for fine focusing, but I put on my reading glasses to see the overall composition and camera settings.
For large format, I have to wear reading glasses for composition and focusing under the dark cloth.

Started wearing reading glasses when I was about 45. I buy the cheap drug store ones and keep several pairs around the house, car, office, etc. It's a bit of a hassle, but you get used to it.

Recent cataract surgery has completely solved my near-sightedness since childhood, so I don't need contacts or glasses for anything more than a few feet away. Unfortunately it doesn't do anything to help the close-up and reading vision.

Frank53 · Mar 17, 2019

It happened to me about 5 years ago, around the age of 60.
Since that time I use (adjustable) diopter lenses. I managed to find a solution for all camera’s (Olympus OM, Contax rf, Hasselblad) but not for the Rolleiflex tlr, so for that one I use reading glasses. Sometimes you can use diopters from one brand to use on another, like Nikon for Olympus OM 1 and 2.
Recently I started using Mamiya 645 af, which solves the problem completely.
Regards,
Frank

Kevin Caulfield · Mar 17, 2019

The Hassy focussing thing is still fine for me and the old Super 8 I've just started using again has a dioptre which works for me so I should count my blessings.

john_s · Mar 17, 2019

For some of us oldies it has worked out well. For 50 years I needed -3 the -2 then -1 diopter because i was short sighted. It was a bit of a drag to keep buying new ones, and different cameras need different values because of their viewfinder characteristics. Now the shortsight has just about vanished, so some cameras work well without correction. But my need for reading glasses has increased of course. Since I use simple cameras I don't usually need to look at settings as I'm used to operating in the dark in theatres etc and learned to set aperture and shutter by counting clicks from one end of the scale.

guangong · Mar 17, 2019

I found spectacles extremely annoying...especially the time wasted looking for them. Recent cataract surgery plus soft contact lenses under hard lenses has given me 20/20 vision. Of course, for best results go to a top notch optometrist. Since we only pass through once, we don’t go for second best when I comes to physical well being.

Colin Corneau · Mar 17, 2019

This has been my experience mostly, too. I keep a few pairs of cheap reading glasses in various places and just deal with it.

jimjm said:
For 35mm bodies, I've installed diopter eyepieces if the body doesn't already have an adjustable diopter.
With medium-format cameras like Rolleiflex or Bronica SQ with waist-level finders, the pop-up magnifier works for fine focusing, but I put on my reading glasses to see the overall composition and camera settings.
For large format, I have to wear reading glasses for composition and focusing under the dark cloth.

Started wearing reading glasses when I was about 45. I buy the cheap drug store ones and keep several pairs around the house, car, office, etc. It's a bit of a hassle, but you get used to it.

Recent cataract surgery has completely solved my near-sightedness since childhood, so I don't need contacts or glasses for anything more than a few feet away. Unfortunately it doesn't do anything to help the close-up and reading vision.

mshchem · Mar 17, 2019

I bought a case of Rayovac LED flashlights. 36 flashlights with 2 AA batteries for 45 bucks. I have found that light makes all the difference . I keep a half dozen of these at various points in my darkroom. Now I can see the f stops on my enlarger lenses.

DWThomas · Mar 17, 2019

I've been wearing progressive bifocals for about the last thirty years, that has worked out pretty well, it's amazing how the brain and eyes adapt! I had cataract surgery about three years ago which got rid of the halos at night and such, although a bit of that is now coming back, apparently an issue of scar tissue which can be laser treated (haven't done that yet). I find the standard diopters on viewfinders seem to work pretty well for me, I must have developed a subconscious sense of where to stick the camera in front of my face. I do imagine that the success of progressives could vary wildly depending on the amount of correction needed.

Poisson Du Jour · Mar 17, 2019

Welcome to old age, Kevin!
My vision drifted at close range way back in 2006. I had prescription glasses made up, which were good, until I knocked these off my head while photographing in Karijini NP/Western Australia, then stepped back on them, reducing them to gleaming splinters! Vowed never to spend that much money again on glasses. Now I get by cheerfully with CLIC magnetic magnifers. A small but valued improvement in vision has taken place since beginning high-dose Krill and Nicotinamide B3 more than 12 months ago. I am not advocating this as a treatment for impaired vision, as the focus of it in my case is specifically to deal with skin cancer but with a surprising knock-on effect that has now attracted the interest of research academics.

I think el cheapo reading glasses are a much better choice if you are in positions where expensive prescription glasses could come to grief, leaving your to fumble your way through!

DWThomas · Mar 17, 2019

Poisson Du Jour said:
I think el cheapo reading glasses are a much better choice if you are in positions where expensive prescription glasses could come to grief, leaving your to fumble your way through!

Dunno what's available in your part of the world, but my last two pairs of progressives, plus a pair of polarized sunglass progressives have come from an online outfit at about $100 USD or so apiece (including frames). Local shops are four or five times that.

Poisson Du Jour · Mar 17, 2019

DWThomas said:
Dunno what's available in your part of the world, but my last two pairs of progressives, plus a pair of polarized sunglass progressives have come from an online outfit at about $100 USD or so apiece (including frames). Local shops are four or five times that.

The Clic reading magnifiers are $88 here, posted via online seller. They can take prescription lenses. The lenses fold up and the frames are adjustable and pliable.

benjiboy · Mar 17, 2019

I have been using Pentax Tailor Made progressive varifocal lenses for about twenty years, I get my eyes tested every year, having my prescription updated when necessary. I can't use eyesight correction lenses on my cameras because I have astigmatism.

ME Super · Mar 17, 2019

I'm rather a bit nearsighted. My current prescription in my right eye is -0.25 spherical, with an additional -1.75 cylindrical to correct for astigmatism. In my left eye, I'm at -1.75 spherical, with an additional -0.25 for astigmatism. So I am more nearsighted in my left eye than my right, but my left eye has less astigmatism than my right.

Interestingly, I'm left-eye dominant. At age 48, I can't wear my distance vision glasses when I use the computer or my phone. Fortunately, at normal reading distances, I don't need reading glasses - I just take the distance glasses off. If I'm closer than that, I have 3 pairs of drug-store readers that I can use, with a strength of +1.25.

When I was at my optometrist's a couple years ago, he said, "How are you doing computer work without reading glasses? Oh wait, let's see, are you left eye dominant?" He did a quick check and said "Yep, that's how you're doing it. Your left eye needs no correction close up, and you're left eye dominant."

I suspect at some point that I'll have to go for the bifocals, but so far, not yet!

pbromaghin · Mar 17, 2019

I use the cheap reading glasses too. It's annoying to put them on to change camera settings and then take them off to focus and shoot. What the heck, getting old sucks.

Andrew O'Neill · Mar 17, 2019

My close up vision has deteriorated a bit but not to the point of needing specs. I do however stick on a pair of dollar store reading glasses to see the aperture settings clearly in dim lighting.

ME Super · Mar 17, 2019

I notice that in brighter light, I don't need the reading glasses as much. I suspect that has to do with the same thing as smaller apertures giving greater depth of field. In brighter light, the pupils are smaller, therefore greater depth of field and more things are in acceptably sharp focus.

Arklatexian · Mar 18, 2019

Kevin Caulfield said:
I've posted this in the B&W Film forum because that's mostly what I do.

Anyway, as of about two or three days ago I've noticed my close-up vision has got worse. Today I was doing a shoot in the darkroom and this was the first time I've had to actually use reading glasses to see the camera aperture settings etc.

I know this happens to most of us but it still comes as a bit of a shock. My wife is a couple of years younger than me and it happened to her about a year or two ago.

So now I suppose I'll have to get used to wearing glasses whilst using a camera. I guess it could be worse.

So how did you cope with deteriorating vision?

By living with it, using glasses, finding a good opthomologist and visiting him/her once a year to be sure your eye problems are not caused by factors other than age. Then, when the time comes, with many people, having cataract surgery. Been there, done all that and my eyesight in the darkroom and out, is better now than it was when I was 40 which was 48 years ago. Yes, it could be worse, especially for a photographer, you could have gone blind so quit griping.......Regards!

Kevin Caulfield · Mar 18, 2019

Thanks for all your replies so far. I'm getting some good ideas. Just bought a few pairs of reading glasses today.

benjiboy · Mar 18, 2019

Arklatexian said:
By living with it, using glasses, finding a good opthomologist and visiting him/her once a year to be sure your eye problems are not caused by factors other than age. Then, when the time comes, with many people, having cataract surgery. Been there, done all that and my eyesight in the darkroom and out, is better now than it was when I was 40 which was 48 years ago. Yes, it could be worse, especially for a photographer, you could have gone blind so quit griping.......Regards!

That's very sound advice your eyesight especially as a photographer is too important to try and manage yourself, you should get some professional advice because buying none prescription reading glasses may not be the answer if you have the many other vision defects a person can develop with advancing age that you can't diagnose yourself.

MattKing · Mar 18, 2019

Every time I see this thread's title, I think of Burton Cummings and The Guess Who:

Pentode · Mar 18, 2019

I’ve always worn glasses for nearsightedness so I haven’t had to get used to shooting with them.

Instead, when my close vision started getting worse a few years ago, I had to get used to removing them to see the controls on the camera.

I switched to progressives about a year ago and it has solved the problem for me. I still shoot with glasses but I don’t have to take them off anymore.

Sirius Glass · Mar 18, 2019

Contact lenses and reading glasses
Peak grain focuser
SLR cameras for 35mm, 120 and 4"x5"

Old Eyes

Kevin Caulfield

jimjm

Frank53

Kevin Caulfield

john_s

guangong

Colin Corneau

mshchem

DWThomas

Poisson Du Jour

DWThomas

Poisson Du Jour

benjiboy

ME Super

pbromaghin

Andrew O'Neill

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ME Super

Arklatexian

Kevin Caulfield

benjiboy

MattKing

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Pentode

Sirius Glass

Old Eyes

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