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We should all be looking after our eyes in this hobby!

Unfortunately I fall into the 'Definately should just can't find them' / by the time I've got settled
can't be bothered to go and get them' categories.

Has anyone got any scary stories to help motivate me into wearing them more often?

I can't help but feel guilty that both my eyesight and modelling/painting are suffering!

Are we talking vision correcting glasses or safety glasses?

Before I start clipping from sprues, I always advise those around me with the airsoft mantra; "Call your hits" and I consider them warned.

as for myself, I wear niether sort.

I wear glasses all day every day. The thought of trying to paint tiny little details on tiny figures without my glasses leads to all kinds of comical thoughts. Beautiful SM paint jobs, only all the paint misses the marine and I end up painting my desk a lot.

As a long time spec wearer, I answered 'yes'.
With the bad astigmatism in one eye, I'd be at serious risk of painting my thumb in my army's colours otherwise.

They're polycarbonate lenses, so they serve as safety specs as well. I had to replace the last pair, as a jet of superglue from a stubborn bottle hit one lens and while most of it came off after some time in the freezer, a small dot wouldn't shift - and it was dead centre, giving me a doozy of a blind spot.

i have glasses but i cbf waring them they = [language edited by moderator]

Please do not use this kind of slang as it is offensive. Moderator Kilkrazy.

I don't wear glasses but if painting somewhere with average light (like my local GW or even the lounge at home), I get eye strain.

My glasses are only for seeing far objects, and close-up I see better without them so no. Anyway, my arthritic fingers start to curl into pain-wracked claws before I've been at it long enough to damage my eyes.

I got glasses back in 3rd grade and I've been wearing them ever since. I never even considered lenses.

And without them I can't even read the screen right

I wear contacts, so no glasses for me.

I wear safety glasses when drilling and grinding (and when cutting the new templates and markers from their sprue's, I swear those things are cousins to fragmentation grenades). As to actual corrective lenses, I've a weak prescription for distance and that's it. I've just seen metal bits pulled out of enough people to know that I'd not like to get them in my eye, hence the safety glasses.

I don't wear any safety equipment when I'm modeling. Although every 3 or 4 years I might be wearing some aviators or something due to my Bell's Palsy.

i dont were glasses... does it hinder your painting? from the above comments i filter down a 'yes'?

only my shoulders hurt after a long painting session

I do wear safety glasses if I am using the Dremel or any other power tools.. sometimes when clipping metal and plastic sprews. Definately when I start clipping heavy guage wire or chain for models. I also wear thimbles when using a crafting knife depending on the cut. Its not a hassle, I keep all that in my hobby box w/ the paint etc.
I guess its a product of working in a machine shop since I was 18 and seeing some horrid accidents involving metal shavings etc. One fleck of metal to the eye can cause loss of sight if it hits right or worse.. an infection where they have to do serious surgery to remove your eye and everything attached to it... (Ive seen it hapen).

always wear glasses and always make sure I have a protective mask as well.

I hate resin cough.

I wear glasses for close work anyway so they definitely help as things seem about 50-75% larger.

The most dangerous thing I have used so far are cheap craft knife blades which snap against the diamond toughness that is sprue plastic and almost make bullet ricochet noises as they fly off in unexpected directions (I use a penknife now).

I got the Lasik surgery a couple years ago, but prior to that I wouldn'tve been able to paint anything without my glasses. Sometimes I wonder if that and things like reading hurt my eyes over the years to begin with. I often get comments like "you're going to go blind painting things that small," when I show people my stuff.

On a similar note, has anyone ever tried using magnifying glasses? I bought one, but then somehow became too lazy to use it. I wonder how effective it would be.

Nine times out of ten I wear glasses, due to general terrible eyesight. But I see much better close up (About two to three inches close up) so for fine details I really have to lose the glasses and leans in dangerously close to the paint-top...

Makes me look like a buffon, but whats more important, how I look, or how Chaos Lord Khor'Ghurneth looks, Amiright?

Safety glasses for anything involving the Dremel or drilling metal. If there's any chance things are flying at high speeds in the vicinity of my eyes, they are on.

Sure, they look goofy. But if you are vain about how you look while modeling your toy soldiers your priorities are misplaced. Besides, if you think you look goofy with safety goggles how goofy are you going to look with an eye patch?

Reading glasses at 1.75 for painting.

The Green Git wrote:s how goofy are you going to look with an eye patch? .

You could cut off one arm and one leg for the full pirate look.

Yarr!

The Green Git wrote: Sure, they look goofy. But if you are vain about how you look while modeling your toy soldiers your priorities are misplaced. Besides, if you think you look goofy with safety goggles how goofy are you going to look with an eye patch?

Im pretty sure its been scientifically proven that eye patches make you look 33% cooler in any given social situation...

I wear glasses normally so I keep them on while modeling (hard to paint what you can't see).

As far as motivation goes, well, once I somehow managed to get a small blob of super glue in the dead center of one of the lenses. I don't remember how it got there, but it had to be when I was wearing them. If I hadn't been, I suppose it could have gotten into my eye. I'll assume the effects of that would fall somewhere between pretty bad and catastrophic.

I wear glasses whilst modelling too...

I don't use glasses to paint but I do use a magnifier light.

I wear glasses all the time anyway, it would be silly, in my case, to take them off just to paint. As another poster put it, it's hard to paint when you can't see.

No glasses for me i use other magnifying equipment.

i actually only where glasses to see far away objects and when im on the computer otherwise i can see what im painting just fine

I need glasses due to stigmatism of the right eye, so once again it'd be silly not to wear them. Though I only started wearing them in january I STILL find myself forgetting them because I'm still not used to them lol. Though in this case I can still paint for a little bit before it all gots to pot.

I normally wear contact lenses but need to wear my glasses for any modelling/painting, otherwise I see little spots before my eyes and it's horrible. I also find trying to work that closely whilst wearing contacts tends to make then get really dry quickly because you don't blink enough when concentrating.

Even though I have bad short sightedness, my optician actually told me to try painting without my glasses or contacts as I hold the model close enough whilst working on it to see it clearly...how spooky is that? Only problem is I can't see the paint pot clearly then.

I got LASIK surgery in the beginning of this year. I have to recommend it to EVERYONE! Best money spent ever. Its an unbelievable feeling to be able to wake up and see what time it is. I'm trying to protect my eyes though and I think I'm going to get a light magnifying kit/setup when I paint.

Also, my Dad got in a bad accident (not with modeling) but with fixing a garage door opener. Didn't wear any safety glasses - spring popped a screw out and he lost an eye. He doesn't have great depth perception now and its hard for him to enjoy the things he was looking forward to in retirement (playing tennis, golf). It also hurts him in the winter since his fake eye gets really cold.

So, when appropriate please wear safety glasses. As cool as an eye patch would be, you should really do everything you can to protect your eyes.