Conflicting info on corrective lens power

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lighthouse

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While picking up my new contacts yesterday and discussing my
prescription with my eyedoctor, we were discussing the
lenses to order for my mask. The lens come in standard
diopter sizes. I am nearsighted and my regular
amount is -3.0 to correct distance vision, but using that
amound makes close vision unreadable for such tasks as
using underwater camera and dive computer.
The eye doctor suggested maybe a -1.5 lens to be middle ground
and she showed my how much better the close vision would be
but the distance wouldn't be as clear.

How far out do I really need to worry about seeing clearly?

I thought about contacts, but I use the expensive gas perm
and at 100 each, don't want to risk them in a flood.

Any suggestions please.
 
This may not answer your question directly but I would recommned getting checked out for lasik surgery. I had it done five years ago and it changed my life. It has made diving and all other sports so much easier.
 
I'm a soft contact user, but I have been having the same issue. If I can see far, I can't see close. I brought up this issue and an Optician PM'd me and said to try a bifocal contact. So I went to my eye care person and at last wednesday's dive I tried a new contact lens. My distant vision seemed the same and close up helped a little, but not much. So my doc gave me a stronger contact for close-up. At about 25-30 feet, my distance vision gets a little blury (the corection is week for distance), but the close up was great. I tried them on last nights dive and they were perfect. As it turns out, I don't need to see that well beyond 20 feet while diving. So during the dive everything I needed to see was sharp and I could now see my guages perfectly (the temp on my computer is so small I could never read it. But last night is was clear!). I won't wear these contacts EXCEPT when I dive. Bottom line, seeing to 20 feet clearly and nice and sharp close up works great for me!
 
There is, I believe, one more option. Apparently you can get half moon lenses that glue onto the bottom half of your dive mask. You essentially get a bifocal mask lenses this way.

I asked my Eye Doctor about just getting bifocal lenses ground to fit my mask but apparently they aren't available that big.

Lasik surgery is definately a strong option.

By the time that it became affordable I was well into my forties and about to lose the focusing power of my eye which would have meant that even with the surgery I would still have needed glasses for close work. Trading one set for another.

Good Luck
 
I JUST saw a commercial for Bausch & Lomb SofLens MultiFocal contact lenses. Apparently quite a bit different from bifocals, they have lots of different gradiations.

http://www.bausch.com/us/vision/products/softcontacts/soflens_multi.jsp

Might be worth a shot, could be cool.

I'm lucky I can see just fine with my -3.25 contacts close and far. Give me 20 years though and I'm sure I'll be looking at multifocals too :wink:
 
I have my topside persctiption bi-focals in my mask and I can see under as well as I see on top. I would not do a trade off like the -1.5, I would want to see close and far subjects.
 
But - my prescription runs about -6 - AND I've shyed away from contacts due to my work - - so, It wasn't anything to decide for me.

The nice part - my LDS had lenses in stock, so we could play "switch them out" until we got it right!

Pulling 1.5 off of your prescription seems a bit much - I took off 0.5. I need to have the mask workable for that walk from the suit-up table to the water, and in my experience, the water doesn't change the prescription THAT much.
Removing 1.5 topside makes glasses into reading glasses - you'll start loosing focus at about 3-4 feet [Hey I just thought about it a little - thats low enough, you can even try one of those Drug Store stock reading glasses to see what it does!]

Good Luck!
 
Why would your perscription for in and out of the water be different? People who don't need glasses don't have masks that uncorrect theit good vision.
 
Why do I want different perscriptions?

I wear contacts (one eye uses correction for near vision and one for distance) but the perscription for proper glasses would be bifocals (which I have yet to breakdown and admit that I am getting old enough to need).
My glasses that I do wear, (for distance), I just take off for reading. So, I am trying to come up with something I can use
for my mask (for which they just sell regular lenses)

I did email Seavision as recommended above to see if they could make bifocals that fit my mask.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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