Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Pistol sights

yarchive.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 331 posts

Re: Pistol sights

#11

Post by chrissnell »

Going target shooting is incredibly relaxing and a great break from the workday. The focus required to sight in a target and control one's breathing, arm, and finger movement is a very powerful relaxant to me and melts stress away.

I work from home and I live in the burbs so pistol or rifle shooting is not possible. However, I've gotten really hooked on shooting (of all things) my Red Ryder BB gun. It doesn't make a loud noise, it costs almost nothing to shoot, and it's surprisingly accurate for how inexpensive it is. These little BB guns have iron sights like the article discusses.

My favorite thing to shoot is little plastic bottles--particularly the ones that over-the-counter medication comes in. They're durable and make a nice popping noise when you hit them. I put them on little stakes in the back yard at about 10-15 yards and shoot at them from my deck. As I got better, I made up little games, like shooting them in a sequence and trying to get 100% accuracy. I find it easy to get back to writing code after doing this for five or ten minutes.

Re: Pistol sights

#12

Post by solotronics »

chrissnell wrote: post #11

Going target shooting is incredibly relaxing and a great break from the workday. The focus required to sight in a target and control one's breathing, arm, and finger movement is a very powerful relaxant to me and melts stress away. I work from home and I live in the burbs so pistol or rifle shooting is not possible. However, I've gotten really hooked on shooting (of all things) my Red Ryder BB gun. It doesn't make a…

shooting for me is incredibly therapeutic you can devote a large portion of your concentration to it and disconnect your brain for a while. I think some of the appeal is that you can see an immediate result of your effort and therefore can attempt to analyze and calibrate your performance. I really recommend shooting with advanced holographic optics because it brings you closer to your own reactions and can help hone your skill.

Re: Pistol sights

#13

Post by kbart »

xtreme wrote: post #10

I wonder if this is related to [Hyperfocal Distance]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperfocal_distance ), a concept familiar to many photographers. Roughly, if you focus on the background (infinity), the foreground would be blurry; and vice-versa. If you focus about ~1/3rd into the scene, you'd have everything in reasonably sharp focus. Unlike camera lenses, our eyes can't easily focus on an arbitrary distance witho…

To stay hyperfocused, you would have to keep your sight focused on a certain dot (probably between sights and target), so it would be extremely hard to align iron sights without focusing on them as our eyes/brain automatically focus on things of interested. Peripheral vision training might help, but I believe, it still would be much harder than aiming in traditional way (focused on front sight only). Actually, our vision is extremely adaptive and after few sessions of practice shooting you don't even notice blurring anymore as it becomes natural.

"Perhaps the front sight is working as an approximation of the hyperfocal distance."

I haven't seen such gun yet. It would not be practical as distance of a target and illumination (two key factors for hyperfocus of human eye) varies greatly.

Re: Pistol sights

#14

Post by c517402 »

Instead of using convolution to produce the imagery, I think it should be produced using fractional Fourier transforms. IIRC fractional Fourier transforms are mathematically equivalent to Fraunhofer and Fresnel diffraction integrals. Although, the convolutions look good.

Re: Pistol sights

#15

Post by wyager »

electrograv wrote: post #7

If you're interested in the science behind this, you may be even more interested in learning how peephole style rear iron sights almost eliminate the dual sight alignment problem of goal-post style rear sights (as commonly found on pistols). The rear peep sight on rifles take advantage of actual "optical effects", without any glass -- much like a pinhole camera can actually magnify images without any lenses or mirror…

I find myself actually getting superior accuracy with small aperture sights than with a standard 1 or 2 moa holographic or red dot sight. There is a bit of a "magnification" effect with a small rear aperture that seems to assist with accuracy.

Re: Pistol sights

#16

Post by binarytransform »

Former JSOC dude here. Circumstances requiring engaging with pistols == bad day for everyone, so only a few things matter. Front sight focus (which implies maintaining equidistance from the rear sight posts), both eyes open, fast presentation, parallel grip, smooth trigger pull, reacquire, repeat as necessary. And optical sights = more things that can break / run out of batteries / fall off and make noise / etc etc.

Re: Pistol sights

#17

Post by gadders »

binarytransform wrote: post #16

Former JSOC dude here. Circumstances requiring engaging with pistols == bad day for everyone, so only a few things matter. Front sight focus (which implies maintaining equidistance from the rear sight posts), both eyes open, fast presentation, parallel grip, smooth trigger pull, reacquire, repeat as necessary. And optical sights = more things that can break / run out of batteries / fall off and make noise / etc etc.

You may be former JSOC, but I've played Call of Duty.

Re: Pistol sights

#18

Post by binarytransform »

gadders wrote: post #17
binarytransform wrote: post #16

Former JSOC dude here. Circumstances requiring engaging with pistols == bad day for everyone, so only a few things matter. Front sight focus (which implies maintaining equidistance from the rear sight posts), both eyes open, fast presentation, parallel grip, smooth trigger pull, reacquire, repeat as necessary. And optical sights = more things that can break / run out of batteries / fall off and make noise / etc etc.

You may be former JSOC, but I've played Call of Duty.

Did we just become best friends? Someone fire up the GoldenEye. Slappers only!

Re: Pistol sights

#19

Post by gadders »

binarytransform wrote: post #18
gadders wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may be former JSOC, but I've played Call of Duty.

Did we just become best friends? Someone fire up the GoldenEye. Slappers only!

TBH, I was lying for comedic effect. I mostly play Borderlands 2 now. I don't like anything with too much strategy.

//edit// Sorry if that sounds too rude. Email in my profile if you want my Steam ID.

Re: Pistol sights

#20

Post by euroclydon »

I have this little drill I do, with a iron sighted handgun or rifle. I give myself no more than 2 seconds to bring the weapon up, acquire the target a shoot. I can pay attention to the rear sights, but then I never hit anything. In this drill, I've found that maintaining a consistent body position, and only paying attention to the front sight yields the best results. I just put the front sight on the target and pull the trigger. Distance about 10-15 yards. Target is soda can.
Post reply on HN