An encounter with Kedok

Whilst out in Australia I met with Geoff Hunter who runs a shooting club for the vision impaired in Sydney. I got the chance to try out the Kedok aiming system. After having read about it for sometime, it was great to actually get my hands on one to test it out.

For those who do not know what Kedok is, it is another aiming device for vision impaired shooters designed by Wim Hager over in the Netherlands. It differs from other available aiming devices as all the design documents have been published online, so you could make your own and even modify it as you feel fit. One of the goals of the Kedok device is to make something which is much more affordable than devices like the ecoAims or the VIASS Pro.

Before discussing what it is like to use, I must note that it currently has not been approved for use in international World Shooting ParaSport competitions. So anyone wanting to compete internationally will need to use something else or apply to get their Kedok approved by WSPS.

Now for what i think about it. Unlike EcoAims and VIASS which use cameras to locate the LED, the Kedok uses a light sensor and so is more similar to the Swarovski device. This has the advantage that sampling of the sensor is much, much quicker and so the sound changes much more smoothly, however it does mean it is more sensitive to differences in lamp or LED set up. In fact when I tried it, Geoff had made a mistake in the set up and the device detected something was wrong when we were calibrating it.

Once the lamp was correctly configured, time to have a listen and shoot with it. As I noted the sound does change very smoothly, takes me back to the Swarovski scope although it does sound a little different. For me being used to the EcoAims sound now, I found the amount of variation in the tone was not really enough and I felt it flattened off too much in the middle. I felt the tone did impact upon my ability to shoot a good group and probably it was no where near what I can do with my EcoAims. I am aware that there are settings which can be changed, but I did not want to go and mess up someone else's aiming device so I left them alone. This though does mean I cannot judge how accurate the device really may be, so I cannot pass comment on accuracy.

Whilst on the topic of settings, it is nice to note how Kedok has speech prompts in the device which allows the shooter to alter settings and to warn the shooter of any problems it detects. It is good to allow the shooter to be as independent as possible. Also I like some of the prompts and how they give the device a bit of personality, such as wishing you good shooting after calibration, rather than just being very boring information only prompts.

Something which I am not so keen on is the separate processing unit which sits on the table. Having used a battery pack fitted to the rifle to power a Swarovski and now using the Ecoaims with its built in battery, I am used to only having a single cable whilst shooting. So it feels like a step back to have a cable from the scope to the processor and then a headphone cable from the processor. I think EcoAims have really set the standard here with the built in battery, so you don't even have a cable for a battery pack.

So in conclusion, I think the Kedok is a step forward from the Swarovski scopes by allowing calibration and customisation with voice guidance. When compared with the EcoAims it just does not do it for me. The problems I have about the sound being too flat might be possible to resolve either through settings or by tweaking the software. The external processor unit is a more significant issue to me and would need a more significant redesign. For those who want to do the sport recreationally or at national level, then this might be a reasonable option to consider if price is important. However for those who want to compete internationally, I would suggest save up and go for something like the EcoAims VIS500 or the VIASS Pro.

Experimenting by mixing the old with the new

For many years the Swarovski ZE-B618 was the most common audio aiming system for vision impaired shooters. The Swarovski system was a light based system requiring a bright lamp and a target with a white centre. However recent the international standard is the infrared LED based systems such as the EcoAims VIS500 or VIASS Pro. This means that many vision impaired shooters are going out and buying new aiming systems, quite a costly thing to do.

I was aware that the Swarovski aiming device although based on light, it does actually detect infrared as well. So I had the thought, can a Swarovski ZE-B618 be used with the infrared LED? If this is possible then it could save many people a lot of expense and also simplify vision impaired shooting competitions where the organisers want to allow people to continue using their old Swarovski aiming devices.

As I am currently having a slight break from training after the World Cup, I decided to do some experimenting to see how well the Swarovski aiming device would work with the infrared LED. First thing to do was use the white centred targets to check that my Swarovski aiming system was offset. I wanted to make sure that when I started my experiments with the LED that I would not hit shoot the LED.

Once I was certain the device was offset, it was time to point the rifle at a target fitted with an LED. The Swarovski was definitely finding the LED and giving me a change in tone. It did sound a bit different to using the target with a white centre, it was smaller and did seem to flatten off a lot in the middle. It was time to put shots down the range and see what sort of group I could achieve. To minimise error from myself, I was shooting using a support rest. Whilst there was a group, the size was much too big for me to even consider using it for competitive shooting, it was out to the 7 ring on a rifle target. May be I was no longer used to the Swarovski sound as I have been shooting with the EcoAims for some time now. Even taking this into account, I don't think the Swarovski aiming device with the LED could ever come to the same accuracy as the newer devices.

So sadly I have to conclude that the Swarovski days for international competition are over. There may be beginner or club level VI shooters where the Swarovski and a LED is more accurate than the shooter, but these would not be limited to using the LED as an aiming mark, they can continue using the target with a white centre.

The equipment I use

For those who would like to know what equipment I use, then you may be interested in the new page I have written which lists my current and previous shooting equipment. Read the my equipment page here. I have left out items which I feel are less significant, however if you are interested in those then contact me with your request.

On that page I have mentioned where I have received support with the equipment, but one I think particularly deserves to be highlighted is that of the boots.

Back in 2007, fellow vision impaired shooter Morag Morrison sadly died of Parkinson's disease. Morag's family wanted to give her shooting equipment to people who would make good use of it, I was asked if any of it would be useful to me and fortunately my feet were the same size as Morag's and so I inherited her boots. Morag's boots continue to serve me well, I thank Morag's family for giving me these boots and I hope they feel I am making good use of them.

History and development of vision impaired shooting

Today's post is probably of greatest interest to those either new to vision impaired shooting or have only seen it a number of years ago. I intend to give a little bit of history of vision impaired shooting and how it has developed over the years.

Firstly a quick summary of how someone with impaired vision shoots. The vision impaired shooter uses the same equipment as would a sighted air rifle shooter, with the one change where the standard sights are replaced with an electronic device which produces via headphones an audio signal to indicate the point of aim. The shooter also has a sighted assistant who may help the shooter locate the correct target and provide details such as where a shot hit the target. For more details please see this page about vision impaired shooting.

Back when I started shooting, around 22 years ago, the aiming device was quite different to the current system. The old Swarovski ZE-B618 was a light based system, where the target was the reverse of the normal target, it required a white centre and a black surround. It also required the target to be illuminated by a 50W halogen lamp. The sound produced by this equipment could be affected by many factors, the quality of the target, the brightness of the lamp and even other light sources such as sunshine through windows in the room. The general view at the time was that an air pistol sized target was the most appropriate target for vision impaired shooters.

Due to me starting shooting at a young age and the equipment available at my school's shooting club, I shot with the rifle supported on a rest. This is how the majority of vision impaired shooters were shooting then and many still do shoot using the support rest. However there were a few who were shooting in the conventional standing position without any additional support for the rifle. Soon after Holwell Rifle Club obtained the aiming equipment for vision impaired shooting in 2005, I started to shoot in the conventional standing position without the support rest.

The scores being achieved back in 2005 were much lower than they are now. For a vision impaired shooter shooting in the conventional standing position, the highest score achieved in competition was 570 integer score on an air pistol target. Over the years the standard has improved, to a point where I could achieve a 600 integer on air pistol targets. However in 2014 I could tell that internationally it was likely that there would be a changed to air rifle sized targets for vision impaired shooting, so with support from my shooting club I started to enter local leagues shooting against sighted shooters using air rifle targets. At this point I felt my shooting really could be compared against any other air rifle shooter.

Due to the target requirements of the Swarovski aiming device, it was difficult for me to get permission to go to any standard shooting competition. However once the newer digital aiming devices started to become available the situation began to change. The newer digital aiming devices only require a battery powered infrared LED to be placed near the target. Also these systems are not affected by differences in lighting condition in the shooting range. This makes it much simpler for competition organisers as the only alteration needed to let me shoot is to place the LED near the target. I remember the comment of how simple it was from the organisers of my first competition with sighted shooters.

Vision impaired shooting has really come a long way since vision impaired shooting of yesteryears and I now feel I can be treated like any other shooter. So when you watch me shoot this weekend, remember I am doing everything the same as all the other shooters, the only difference is I am using my ears instead of my eyes.

EcoAims software information and tips

After a few days of blog admin updates, back to information about shooting equipment. This post will be of particular interest for users of the EcoAims VIS500 as I will be discussing the EcoAims software.

Over the last couple of weeks I have helped a couple of friends with their EcoAims VIS500 aiming devices and the software. This reminded me about the situation with the software and I think it might be useful to give some tips here for everyone. There are two pieces of software for the VIS500, the training software and the setup tool.

The training software

The training software allows the computer to show where the gun is pointing and will estimate the score of shots. This means you can use your EcoAims VIS500 as an electronic trainer and do dry-fire training. Whilst this may seem like a nice feature, unfortunately in reality it is not of great value:

1. The software is not really accessible with a screen reader and so those who rely on a screen reader will only be able to hear the shot score at the time of taking the shot. You will not even be able to configure software settings. To get the most from the software you probably will want sighted assistance.
2. Sighted people tell me that even when you can see, the information available is very limited in comparison to what is provided in other electronic trainers, for example Scatt. When using Scatt, there is an amazing amount of statistics available, enough to confuse many people but in the right hands a really valuable resource to allow you detailed analysis of your shooting.

My recommendation is, if you want serious electronic training, then you will need to buy something else.

The VIS500 setup tool

Thankfully as it is more important, the setup tool can be used by a screen reader user independently, however this is still not entirely issue free as some of the labelling of the controls is not correctly read. If you know the order of the controls as you tab around the window, then you will be able to access everything.

Below is a description of the user interface for version 1.1.

IMPORTANT: Remember to press the read parameters button to retrieve the settings from the VIS500. When you have finished changing the settings, remember to press the set parameters button to save the settings back to the aiming device. Failing to press the button to set the values will lead to no changes in the device settings.

The sound tab

1. On time edit box; the length of time the pulsed tone will be on, the length of the pulse.
2. Off time edit box; the length of time the pulsed tone will be off, or the time between pulses.
3. Off amplitude edit box; how lound the tone will be for the off part of the pulsed tone. Low values will be quieter and high values will be louder.
4. Pulse region; whether you want the tone to pulse inside or outside the zone. Select inside to have it pulse near the target centre, select outside to have it pulse near the target edge.
5. Pulse zone size slider; Select how large you want the zone for the pulsed tone to be.

Sound curve tab

This tab only consists of three radiobuttons to select between three different sound curves, A, B or C. A sound curve is how the pitch varies relative to the centre. I have not found a description for the different sound curves and I can only recommend try them all and select which you prefer or shoot best with.

Sensor tab

On this tab there is just one slider to set the sensitivity of the shot sensor. Lower values make the scope less sensitive and higher values make it more sensitive. I found that normally only one or two values works well for a particular rifle, correctly detecting shots whilst not incorrectly detecting other bumps and clicks.

Software version tab

This allows you to check the version of the software installed in the VIS500. Unfortunately if you have an old version you would need to send it to EcoAims or may be a dealer to get the software updated.

Using it with a Mac

EcoAims have no version of the software for MacOSX. Users of those computers will need to either:

1. Install windows on their Mac, through virtual machine software such as VmWare or directly with BootCamp
2. Alternatively find a Windows PC, even a fairly cheap PC should run the software as it is not very heavy on resources.

Even if there were software for MacOSX, the experience may not be too good. I once had my VIS500 connected to my Mac when it booted into MacOSX and it seems like VoiceOver was getting input events from the VIS500, as if it thought the VIS500 was a Braille display or something, which was sending VoiceOver crazy. When I disconnected the VIS500 VoiceOver went back to normal. I doubt this can be corrected by EcoAims without entirely redesigning how the VIS500 communicates with the computer.

New shooting suit

It may have been some time since I last posted, however I am still doing shooting. Before getting on to 2019, a post about something which happened at the very end of last year. I got a new shooting jacket and trousers from Mouche.

My old shooting jacket and trousers, I got second hand back in about 2011, and whilst it had been altered, it had just got to a point where it was not fitting me well. Unusually for shooting clothes it appears mine had grown, there was just too much material for it to give any good amount of support. With the World Championships coming up in October 2019, it felt like it would be a good time to change it.

Having heard good things from other members at my shooting club about their Mouche jackets and trousers, mid December found me on a flight out to Germany. As I was not going to arrive until about lunch time, the first day consisted mainly of being measured, getting an initial fit on the jacket and selecting the colours. The measuring process was thorough, but being carried out efficiently by Ursula it did not take too long, so giving me and my coach some time to explore the town and get some food. When we returned later in the afternoon, there was an initial version of the base part of the jacket to try for fit. My first impression was how different it felt to my old shooting jacket, which made it difficult for me to know what felt right or wrong. As for selecting the colours, a job I never know how to approach as not being able to see the colours means I will not be able to form my own views without influence from others. There was one thing I knew I wanted, it should be easy for people to spot me and it should be quite distinct. After a bit of discussion we settled on the colours and there was nothing more for me to do that day.

The next morning when I returned, the trousers were ready for some initial fitting. Again how strange it felt in comparison to my old shooting trousers, but I think I was getting used to the idea it was going to feel a lot tighter. Unfortunately for me there was not going to be quite enough of one of the colours to do my original design, so time to decide upon an alternative colour scheme. Once that was done, again time to let work be done on finishing the jacket and trousers, so I went of with my coach in search of a Christmas market, but we were too early as it was due to start that weekend.

Later that day when I returned the suit was nearly complete and time for the final fitting. Also time to try it in both the standing and prone positions. I think now I was starting to notice the support I was getting from the new suit and what my old suit was lacking. This was also a changce for my coach to see how it all was looking on me. A few more tweaks and it was all done and ready for me to take home.

Once home, I eagerly awaited my first training session with my new suit. Although feeling different to what I was used to, everything seemed to be good. Unfortunately with Christmas and new year, along with some refurbishment at my shooting club, it meant I then had a break of a few weeks after my first week of using the new suit. When I resumed shooting after the new year, I must have forgotten how the new suit felt as it took me a bit of time to get comfortable with my shooting again. However since then I have got more comfortable with my shooting and am really pleased with my new shooting kit.

New aiming device, VIASS Pro, is it the future?

With the announcement that Swarovski are discontinuing production of the ZE-B618 acoustic scope, a new aiming device is needed. Whilst I feel that the real future is to have a system like the Scatt MX02 or the aiming system for the blind made by Wings Group which works with the standard ISSF target, at an international level in the sport there seems to be a preference to go towards using systems which have an infrared LED placed near the target. One such infrared based infrared device is the VIASS Pro. Based on having seen one and the features it has I decided to buy one, below is my view of what the VIASS pro is like.

Swarovski: The benchmark to beat

Before discussing the VIASS, it is probably worth quickly recapping the Swarovski to make it clear what the benchmark is. The general principal of the Swarovski is that it contains a light sensor mounted within a telescopic sight, and when it detects more light the higher the tone it produces. We suspect that it may be averaging light over a certain area and it has also been suggested that it may do some centre weighting to bias the signal to light in the centre of its view. Precisely how the electronics work is not known for certain, but we have strong reason to believe it is an analogue system, which has the advantage that the tone changes smoothly. As the tone varies continually it has no concept of a tone relating to a specific scoring ring on the target, it is for the shooter to evaluate when they believe they have the highest pitch tone and that it is as steady as they can achieve. The system has very little customisation available, there is a small screw adjuster behind a plastic cap at the back of the scope to adjust the frequency of the tone it produces and there are adjusters to correct the mean point of impact. Its a very simple device, but it works very well with scores of over 90 on the smaller rifle sized card being achievable, I think it has sufficient resolution to allow one to shoot a 10 on the rifle sized card, it is just being a good enough shooter which limits that. The Swarovski has been in production for a long time, I have heard people say as early as the 1970s or 1980s. The quality and reliability of the Swarovski is good and it is not unknown for them to last well over 10 years.

VIASS: The newcomer

Now to the VIASS Pro, the new comer, in fact so new that there is no online shop and you need to place your order via email and make payment through bank transfer. In these days of the online shop with next day delivery and automated order updates, it was quite noticeable the contrast in ordering the VIASS, although really it wasn't a problem. Rather than include photos here, I will let you visit the VIASS website for pictures, an audio sample of its output and full specifications.

The first thing I noticed when picking it out of its box is how light it is in comparison to the Swarovski. According to its specifications it only weighs 190g, which is less than half the weight of the Swarovski. VIASS even suggest you could use it on a pistol, although you would need to find a pistol with a dovetail to accept the scope mount. Much of the weight saving I guess is due to the use of plastic rather than metal. Whilst saving weight, this leads to my first concern with it, how stable and secure the components are mounted and how it will last over time. Hopefully if one looks after it, providing the plastics used are good quality, it should be able to last without issue.

Unlike the Swarovski which uses standard telescopic sight mounts, the VIASS has a clamp mount built in. Again may be it saves weight and might be cheaper to produce, it does mean that the gun you use will need to have a dovetail and can accept a clamp which is the full length of the scope. On my Steyr I fitted it to the rear rail but the rear end of the clamp still hangs off the end of the rail, this though should not be an issue as there is plenty of clamp holding it in place. However as the scope is shorter than the Swarovski and so on my Steyr is all behind the loading port, may be it will mean it will interfere less with loading mechanisms than the Swarovski did.

Power is provided through a mini USB port on the top of the device. I possibly question placing it up there, it just doesn't look like it will help stability of the rifle. However in use it did not seem to cause an issue. The scope is supplied with a USB battery and 30cm cable, obviously the intention is that you will mount the battery on the rifle although you could use a USB extension cable and put the battery in your shooting jacket pocket and save weight on the rifle. I am not keen on the supplied battery, it has a push button to turn it on and off, but the status is only indicated by LEDs which is not good for those with no sight, but there are plenty of other USB power packs out there. The headphone socket is on the right hand side of the scope, should you let the cable hang down you may find they get caught by the loading lever or hang over the pistol grip. I did a little cable management on the rifle to keep the cables out of the way.

Now everything is rigged up, to the controls. All controls are at the rear of the device. The manual is not very descriptive for those with no sight and you will need someone to explain which is which. Here is a description for you. On the back of the device there are three small rotary controls, the left one being slightly higher than the other two. The left most rotary control is the volume control and you will find four buttons around it, one above, one to the left, one to the right and one below. These four buttons are the arrow keys which are used for adjusting the point of aim. These buttons are so designed that to do multiple presses you need to release and repress the button for each adjustment, this means you will not accidentally adjust it more than you intend. Each adjustment is confirmed by a beep in the headphones. The middle rotary control adjusts the main aiming tone frequency and there seems to be a good amount of variation available. The right most rotary control adjusts the pitch of the frequency of the tone for the centre region. These controls allow you lots of flexibility in how you have your sound set up, the centre tone can be lower than the lead in tones, it can be the same as the highest lead in tone or it can be higher than the lead in tones. When you have your tones set up as you like them, you can remove the rotary control knobs so they will not get accidentally changed. I probably will not remove them as they are fiddle to refit and I don't think they will be prone to accidental adjustment.

At the very bottom of the control panel there are three buttons, at the moment the left most button which is labelled F1 is the most useful, it adjusts the size for the centre tone between a rifle and pistol sized target. I have been told this will be adjustable with the computer when the software is released. The middle button is labelled F2 and will change the training software between rifle and pistol targets, and the right button labelled F3 will change the training software between sighting and competition. Again this needs the software to be released before it can be used. I do hope the software will come soon.

So how is it to use when shooting. When the device is turned on but not pointing at the target it does not make a sound, only once it starts detecting the infrared LED does it start producing tones. This whilst reducing the hand movement you need to do between shots, as a long time Swarovski user I kept finding myself automatically reaching for a on/off switch which does not exist on the VIASS. The next thing to notice is that as a digital system the transition of the tones is stepped rather than being a smooth variation. With other digital systems I have not liked this stepped tone, but with the VIASS whilst I would say it is not quite as nice as the Swarovski, it did not seem to distract me in my shooting.

You may have noticed me refer to a tone for the centre region. Yes that is right the VIASS has a different tone indicating the center region. The frequency of the tone does not vary within this center region and if set too large will mean that you will not be able to achieve the best accuracy. Equally set it too small and you will be able to hear very small movements you may not be able to stop and so may lead to you over trying and taking too long on a shot. The VIASS website has a sample sound. The sample sound is configured with the centre region being a lower tone than the lead in tones. This to me feels slightly odd that you need to increase the frequency of the tone and then suddenly it will drop when you get to the very middle. However remember you can adjust the frequencies of the tones and so it need not be that way round.

Something which did surprise me was that the mental load on trying to aim with the VIASS actually seemed less. Also it seemed like I may be was finding the target a bit easier and quicker than with the Swarovski. There could be two reasons for this. As the VIASS makes no sound until it finds the infrared LED and there are not many other sources of infrared it means that it will only start making tones when you find the target. With the Swarovski you could find a slightly brighter patch near the target which causes a slight raise in tone and then you start aiming with that patch of light only to not be able to find a tone which would relate to the centre of the target, so you waste time investigating light spots which are irrelevant. The other reason being that the centre tone of the VIASS can be very distinct from the lead in tones, where as the Swarovski the more accurate you are the less the tone will vary.

There were a couple of small issues I found. One is when doing multiple presses on a arrow key it did not seem to respond to every press if doing it quickly. If you are aware of this then it seems perfectly workable, just wait for each beep to finish and do the presses at a steady rate. The other issue is a slightly more puzzling one, there were occasions when taking a shot the scope would just emit a long beep which had no relationship to the point of aim. I don't know for sure but it almost seemed like the device was restarting. It seemed to mainly happen just after taking a shot, normally when it had been held in the centre region for some time. May be with firmware updates these issues can be solved.

Now the question how accurate is it. Supposedly the resolution of the camera is such that it can detect movements of 0.7mm. Trying it out in practice I cannot verify that, but the accuracy does seem to be at least as good as the Swarovski. When firing it off a stand to test it out for accuracy, I heard a comment from behind saying that it was worryingly accurate, may be that says it all. It has been suggested that may be in the future there will be a replacement lens for prone which will lead to it detecting 0.3mm movement, although this would lead to a smaller field of view and so you will get less lead in and will need to find the target more accurately.

Infrared LED options

Quickly to describe the options you have for LEDs. VIASS offer two versions, one which is a small board and a power cable, again using a USB battery for power. The board can be fitted to an eleectronic target with velcro or such like. The other option is a small LED powered by a button battery which is mounted to a cardboard mask which is the same size as a air pistol target. The idea being that you can put this in a target changer with a paper target, as the two are the same size you should be able to get the LED in the same place relative to the centre of the target each time. This has one advantage over the electronic target system, it means that you do not need to go down range when using paper targets. May be electronic target manufacturer's could start including the infrared LED in their target systems and that would mean also not needing to go down range to install a LED.

Conclusion

So would I say VIASS is a worthy replacement for the Swarovski. From what I have seen it has the potential to, although may be it could do with some small improvements. The firmware glitches I mentioned hopefully will get sorted and will be user updatable. The computer software still needs to be released and is required to access certain features of the device. Providing these get addressed, then my only concern is the reliability and this will only be known with time. When considering the price, how long a device will last is certainly important to determine if it is worth the cost. With no track record of previous devices and the VIASS Pro being new, I feel may be the asking price is a bit high particularly considering that there is no mention of a multi-year warranty, although multi-year warranties mean nothing should the company discontinue the model or go out of business. Swarovski could ask much as they did because you could be fairly certain of it lasting for ages. May be in a few years once the reliability is established VIASS may have earned a reputation which could be seen to deserve such a asking price.

For those who cannot afford this then cheaper options may be needed. Whether something such as Kedok might be worth looking at.

Headphones

This post is partly inspired from a question put to me at the British Championships. It was asked, why I and others in this country use the headphones with a head band for shooting where as in photos of the European Championships many seemed to be using in-ear headphones?

There are two parts to this answer, why clubs should use the headphones which sit on the ear rather than in-ear ones, and why I personally choose to use the sort I do.

I would recommend that clubs use the sort of headphone which sits on the ear for one simple reason, hygene. Just imagine sharing in-ear headphones with others, stuffing things in to your ears which have been stuffed in other people's ears. The idea just does not appeal to me and we're probably best to avoid trying it to find out what happens.

My personal reason is a bit different, I have my own set of headphones so I would not be sharing them with others. My reason is that I have simply never been comfortable with in-ear headphones. Well may be if I spent a lot of money on a decent set, possibly even a custom pair I might find them comfortable but that is a lot of money to spend on something you do not know whether you will like. A better option seemed to be to go with what I know I find comfortable, and that's not just any old set of on ear headphone. For some reason I have trouble with headphones which apply pressure to the actual ear, after some time of wearing this can become painful and as for shooting I will be wearing them for a decent amount of time then they need to be comfortable. I tend to need to use headphones which put the pressure actually on to the skull, so the first set I used for shooting when I bought a pair of my own was the Koss PortaPro. The PortaPro is slightly unusual as there a fairly small set of headphones, the ear pads hardly cover the ear and they have a separate adjustable pad above the ear pad which sits against the skull. The adjustment on the second pad is to adjust what pressure is taken by which pad.

Those more observant amongst you will have noticed I am not using the PortaPros any more, well at least for shooting. The problem is that they are an open headphone so will let a lot of sound escape from them and it was suggested I needed to be careful in case anyone complained about my headphones making too much noise. So I stepped up a bit to some Senheiser HD280 headphones. These are great, I actually think I can pick out a very little more detail when shooting and the full earcup design means the pressure again is taken directly by the skull and they do not leak so much sound. The heavier cable on the HD280s can be a bit annoying, however we tend to clip it in one of the number clips on the back of the shooting jacket. The only other thing I find a problem with these is that if its warm it can get quite warm inside the headphones.

So I have given quite a bit of detail why I have personally chosen the headphones I do, what do others use? What are the advantages of other types such as in-ear ones? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Foot guide to help getting the same position each time

It seems like a little creation which I developed with my coach has been noticed last weekend at the British Championships, a foot guide to help in the set up process. As some interest has been shown then may be I better explain what it is, how I use it and when I think its appropriate.

Last year when I was training for the European Championships I was doing more training and so had different assistants on different days. We noticed that the set up of the position is very important for free standing and that it was hard for those unfamiliar with my shooting to help me get the correct position. As a good shooter will normally be taking the same position we decided to create a guide which shows my foot position. This guide is a piece of hard board with the front parts of my feet cut out on one side, obviously cut in the places where I normally put my feet for shooting.

When it comes to actually shooting, my assistant lines up the guide on the floor, helps me locate my feet into the foot holes and then removes the board. I normally maintain my position throughout the whole competition and so this is only done at the very beginning.

I have referred to this as a guide, there may be times when for some reason I need to make very small adjustments to my foot position after using the foot guide. Also as positions can develop with time, it may need to be something which is looked at from time to time to check that the guide is actually giving the shooter the optimum position for them.

I have seen some suggest that they were considering such a guide to help with beginners, I really doubt I could suggest such a thing. One reason is that the guide is probably specific to a given shooter as everyone has a slightly different position which they find comfortable. Also it may not be a good idea for beginners as they need to learn to feel for when the position is correct, as I noted I even may sometimes make small adjustments from what the guide says because I feel the position isn't quite right. If a beginner were to start by using a guide, they may rely on a guide too much and not really check how the position feels.