If you want to improve underwater vision you need to be in the water constantly and get used to focusing. Some studies have been done on cultures that rely on freediving for food and found their underwater vision can be twice as good as the average person's. Further studies found while there is a genetic component this can be a trained skill. Milk in the eyes is a trick for reducing irritation after getting out of a chlorine pool.
I have never been able to swim with goggles even as a young id, they hurt, they are uncomfortable and they fill with water making my eyes feel like they are in a fish tank.... i also can't NOT open my eyes underwater either chlorine or salt, maybe I'm just lucky but i have never had an issue with pain in my eyes or unable to see underwater.....is that strange :S ....my eyes are photophobic so normal house lights, or sun or even just outdoors hurt my eyes and i have to wear strong uv repellent sunglasses made t block out most of the light to be able to see properly even indoors, that being said i see really well in the dark and like i said also underwater..... i suppose I'm just really odd :S
I remember that also...if only you coud channel frogs as well as mermaids, then you might have success!
Hey guys, I just spent a little while searching online for everything I could find on contact lenses to enable underwater vision. For one thing, here is the thread on deeperblue.org that Nemo was talking about, and here is the company that makes underwater lenses:
http://forums.deeperblue.com/freediv...-vision-2.html
http://www.otticarocchi.com/ENG/home_ENG.htm
That Italian company, Ottica Rocchi, was the only company I could find that makes contacts for underwater vision, so I assume those are what Hannah Frasier was talking about when she mentioned underwater contact lenses in here FAQ:
"I paid $1000 for specially designed underwater contact lenses that had a convex magnifying spot over the pupil to readjust the angle of vision to be able to see clearly underwater. They worked about 80% as good as a pair of goggles, however, the design seems faulty as they fell out of my eyes within 5 minutes of wearing them underwater. I followed all the instructions, tried again and the same thing happened. So I cant endorse that product."
Assuming she's talking about Ottica Rocchi, not only does the quote reveal that they cost $1000, but also that they kept falling out for her. This is kinda discouraging, but I have some other leads.
Here is a patent for an underwater contact lens design filed in 1996. It has some links to related patents, that might lead us to some other companies that make underwater lenses, if there are any out there.
http://www.google.com/patents/US5831713
Also, here's an article from 2007 in the magazine Contact Lens Spectrum on underwater vision. The important part of the article is right here, where it suggests that underwater vision contacts might be possible just by recreating extreme nearsightedness!!
"In lieu of extraordinary accommodation, could an extremely nearsighted individual see underwater with the naked eye? While there are potential physiological implications of chemical and microbial contamination of the ocular surface, the short answer is yes. This makes extreme myopia advantageous for seeing underwater, which brings up a unique proposition: could contact lenses lend individuals who don't have extreme myopia good vision underwater?
With a high enough amount of plus power, it's surely possible if the contact lens stays on the eye. To be sure, the on-eye stability of a GP lens underwater is suspect, especially with an interpalpebral fit. Yet by comparison, the eyelid stabilizes soft and hybrid contact lenses over the superior and inferior lens edges. Additionally, work by Diefenbach (1988) indicates that when soft hydrogel lenses are exposed to swimming pool water and hypotonic solution, the contact lenses adhere to the cornea and stop moving."
http://www.clspectrum.com/articlevie...ticleid=100720
I don't want to get my hopes up, but if that's true (and its extremely hard to believe), underwater vision could be achieved using regular contact lenses with a particular prescription!
Guys, help me look into this further. I really wish I could see underwater without goggles. It would quite literally be a dream come true.
As I need to wear contacts during the day, I also wear them for swimming and most of the time they stay on my eyes. I keep and use my 'old' monthly contacts for swimming instead of trowing them a way at the end of the month (my eyedocter know about it and do the same, he's a diver). I train to see underwater by diving up those diving-sticks that children use but then in the deep end of the pool (3m50).
Update on this- so I called some optometrists today to find out if what the article in Contact Lens Spectrum said is true- that any optometrist can get you off the shelf contact lenses for underwater vision- its just a matter of finding the correct prescription.
The optometrist that I spoke to said that, yes, it would be possible to get contact lenses that corrected vision underwater provided you could find the correct prescription. However, he strongly discouraged wearing contact lenses underwater due to the high risk of a bacterial infection.
I wonder if it might be possible to reduce the risk of an infection by using hard contact lenses or swimming in chlorinated water... obviously I don't want to take any chances with my eyes, but if we could find a safe way to do this it would be awesome.
Of course, there is an alternative to contact lenses for vision correction- eyeglasses. Do you guys think that that defeats the purpose cause you may as well be wearing goggles? Personally I think a mermaid with glasses looks cool. Here's a picture of Freckled Kisses at the WMAs:
Oh, also if you wanted to have clear vision underwater without any mask or glasses, I assume you could get LASIK surgery to give you perfect vision underwater, but of course you'd need corrective lenses whenever you were out of the water.
In terms of bacterial infection, you could use drops before and rinse immediately after with saline to cut down on it. If you're really paranoid you could use a disinfecting drop. You probably have to have a prescription for the medical eye drops though. I have an "eye wash tea" that has eyebright and goldenseal as well as a few other things, that disinfects, soothes, and heals without harming and speed heals the eyes when you have an eye injury (like rust or porcelain flakes as one person used it for). Goldenseal is an antimicrobial (natural antibiotic basically, but only kills the bad bacteria) so that'd be the key point here. You just use the herbs to make a tea, then strain it out super well then use a tincture dropper to drop the tea in your eyes. Just thought I'd throw that out there
Personally, for the amount I rely on my glasses on a day to-day situation, I would not feel good about submerging them in a pool of any kind of water, salt or chlorine, unless my life depended on it. It could ruin the coating on the lenses of the glasses, and / or the frame, if kept under for an extended period of time. Plus your eyes are still going to get blurred due to the watery surroundings. I'm not sure it wearing eyeglasses would even help, as there is no seal to protect your eyes from getting affected to the water.
I wear acuvue (sp?) contacts and I was in a pool for almost two hours doing my photoshoot, eyes open most of the time and not once did my contacts pop out. I wear mine for about 3 months solid so maybe they stick to my eyes better than most contacts. Did this the other day for an afternoon at the pool and didnt have any troubles either.
~A mermaid found a swimming lad, picked him for her own, pressed her body to his body,and made the sea their home~
I don't know if this is the consensus among all eyecare professionals, but the optometrist I spoke to for information said that opening your eyes underwater while wearing contact lenses is much more dangerous that opening your eyes underwater normally. I don't know how likely it is to get an eye infection, but the consequences can be incredibly serious. He said there are kinds of bacteria that can cause permanent blindness within 24 hours of exposure. Basically a lens touching your eye is worse than having you eye exposed directly to the water since normally blinking can offer a lot of protection against an infection, but if bacteria gets under the contact then blinking won't help.
Again, this is just what he told me. If someone can find someone who says otherwise I'd consider that great news, cause I was discouraged to hear what this optometrist said.
Bummer...I'm pretty nearsighted (-5 and -6), tried submerging today without my vision-correcting contacts...and the panorama was just as blurry as it was with contacts. I swam around for 10 minutes hoping it would adjust. It didn't, so I put my contacts in so I could at least see OUT of the water. :-(
Maybe I'm TOO nearsighted? :-S *confused*
infection or not, i'm tempted to wear my contacts anyway because i'm blind as a bat. being underwater doesnt have the greatest visual distance or clarity...but coming up above water im worried about depth perception and disorientation.
i do caution though: infections are serious. i have watched my best friend go thru intense eye ulcers covering large percentages of her corneas twice! if you have never seen this...you dont want to. each time had her in bed curtains drawin crying around the clock from pain for 2 months each bout, in the hospitals for quick expiring custom made prescription drops, and it left horrible scars on her eyes. you dont want that.
I wear my contacts while swimming, but I don't open my eyes under water because I'm worried my contacts will get flushed out.
Tenacity.
I found out this weekend while at the beach that swimming with glasses (ok they were sunglasses) were really helpful. Not because it helped with clarity but because while I was moving through the water I didn't have the constant stream of water moving over my eye (which has always been an irritant and discomfort). It was like a windshield for my eyes ^_^ Not sure if you can say this fits into this topic but I thought it was worth a though and that this was the best bet of a place to post it.
Last edited by Mermaid Sirena; 07-17-2012 at 06:41 AM.
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that sounds like a good idea. your eyes can adjust to the concentration of things in the w ater with it being berrated by it with force, and eventually ditch the sunglasses as your eyes will be more tolerant.
I'm a little scared of putting things in my eyes. Would it be a good idea to just stick to goggles or is it worth it to swim without them? My eyes are kind of sensitive...I'm really nervous/scared when it comes to safety things like this.
Mermaid-in-training Coming through! :3
Notice that before, people who holded their breath to go depper (before the glasses for scuba dive) put olive oil in their eyes. I tried this yesterday and it works ! It really helps me cause my eyes can't stand chlorine water (a little problem for a mermaid, huh ?)
I have heard of the h2o girls putting milk in their eyes? Has anyone tried this? does it help?
"Silence is beautiful, not awkward. The human tendency to be afraid of something beautiful is awkward."
I don't know but I think it's not "oily" enough. It may be clean by water very quickly. But I know that in a lot of films, they use special lenses to see underwater. My father wanted to buy some but it's so expensive that he renounced.... I think it was 300-400€ for the 2 lenses...
geeezzz! I might try olive oil but I hate putting drops in my eyes O.o
"Silence is beautiful, not awkward. The human tendency to be afraid of something beautiful is awkward."
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