How to make your own bar reader sheet

By Mike Robinson

Self-made bar reader sheets

"These are my homemade red/blue reading bars for getting both eyes working together. Wear red/blue glasses and hold it over your book or tablet. I got the clip on red/blue glasses and assortment of colored acetate sheets on Amazon. I cut the sheets into strips and, for the smaller one, I glued them onto a clear cd case cover, just using glue at the top and bottom. For the larger one I cut a hole in the middle of a file folder, put glue all over the inside of the folder, placed the strips so they're glued top and bottom and then closed the folder to stick it all together and make it more rigid."

Illustration of the principle that underlies
the practice of bar reading. One is forced to use
both eyes while reading otherwise
parts of the text are invisible.

Alternation, cyclopean eye and the attentional spotlight

As my eyes are aligned most of the time by now I have no real concept of alternating between both eyes anymore. Despite the mechanical alignment of my eyes, I still do not use them equally. My vision still seems to be rather lateralized to the right. When I intentionally give myself double vision by moving my eyes apart, the image from my right eye is still the 'main image' and the one from the left eye feels secondary. In fact, in double vision mode I can still alternate. I can switch main images and make the one from the right eye 'secondary'. So my subjective viewing perspective is not yet positioned in the middle of my head. My cyclopean eye is not positioned behind my nose. Most of the time I'm seeing the world from the right side of my head (subjectively, because this probably indicates there's a strong lateralization towards the left hemisphere). This means that even though my left eye nicely follows my right eye, it's still not an equal part of the team.

I'm doing a couple of things to actively work on that. As mentioned in previous entries I apply filters or transparent tape on my glasses to blur out vision in my dominant eye putting the left eye in charge. This changes the entire visual situation to the other extreme without entirely discouraging binocular eye teaming. I do this while doing all kinds of activities and it is effective in regaining and integrating the left eye into the visual system. But lately there's more... Aside from actively training, it is equally important in my experience to relax and just play with your perception. Often I lie or sit down and let my eyes wander around having things go double. Rather than constant pathological diplopia or double vision this is controlled physiological diplopia I can instantly resolve at will. So during those playful sessions I give myself double vision (vergence), blur and unblur my vision (accommodation) and more generally flex my visual system without overdoing it. Then I try to focus my attentional spotlight in between  the two images so neither one of them is the main or secondary image. I'm trying to rebalance the equation by relaxing, playing, flexing, dreaming, focusing attention in the middle of the double images. It's pretty cool but the circumstances need to be right. One of the biggest problems facing visually impaired people in recovering is intolerance and lack of understanding. After all, I'm well informed  now and I found a place to rest my head but things have been different...

Another interesting topic I wanted to bring up again is how awesome bar reading is. I think this exercise is so cool because of its simplicity and capacity to combine cognitive integration while doing visual exercise. It also clearly shows that visual problems are a biology problem, not a technology problem. All you need is a piece of plastic, cheap glasses, a book and a peaceful environment. In the past I would clearly express to other people how I had to chose between eye alignment or cognitive activity like reading. Not that they'd understand. :) That situation of course makes it very hard to read if you experience double vision rather than suppression... Now I'm entering a stage where I can more or less do the visual stuff and the cognitive stuff at the same time. The line between the visual brain functions and other cognitive abilities is blurry at best so we might just say overall capacity is improving. Reading comprehension while bar reading isn't very good but I'm trying to go for good visual exercise rather than intellectual distinction for the moment. In adherence to this idea, I'm going to try paint an old chess board in red and green colors. That would be nice visual and cognitive integration too if I can make it to be 'cheat proof'.

This week I finally received all supplies needed to try tDCS and I will do it this weekend. To be continued...

Free anti-suppression Solitaire

Get your red green anaglyph glasses and play anti-suppression solitaire. All you need is an internet browser so it works on any platform.

Download the game here

Code by Ed Spencer
Color adjustments by Mark Berbezier

Enjoy!