Possible video: How to use your monitor if you sit infront of it 16/24 ?

[Bert the Derp]

Hey Forum,

 

I've been an IT Engineer for 10+ years now and I'm trying to do my best to preserve my eyesight. I'm working from home and using the same PC for work and R&R.

- I'm using blue light filter glasses

- I'm alwaysusing the PC in an illuminated room

- Monitors are set to 30% brightness (a bit dark, but manageable)

- Night mode also used

 

Despite all of the above, I'm still experiencing itching and burning eyes quite often. I wonder if you guys have any more ideas how to prevent my eyesight.

[manikyath]

2 minutes ago, Bert the Derp said:

(a bit dark, but manageable)

that's already wrong. you want the light level to 'match' the surroundings, so that it's easy to read, but not overly bright.

 

past that, make sure they're at eye height, and the distance between your eyes and the monitor is adjusted well so you can easily read any text you may encounter.

 

also - i'm of the opinion the "illuminated room" thing is mostly a myth. you want light level to match between the display and the surrounding room. that's ofcourse easiest if the light level is set artificially too, but that doesnt mean it has to be all bright all the time. i find bright rooms straining in general, wether or not a display is involved.

[TetraSky]

Monitor brightness depends on the monitor itself. Mine is set at 45, because it is enough. There's very little difference between 50 and 100 on my monitor.

Then... I don't use any of the "night light" built-in stuff. They don't go far enough.

I just use "lightbulb".

6250k color + 90% brightness during daytime and 2680k + 40% brightness during night time (These are the settings I found worked best for me, with HDR OFF. Night time colors and brightness need to be higher if I leave HDR enabled all the time).

With a transition of 1 hour. Can be easily disabled if I want to watch a movie and activate HDR.

 

Lights on during the day and lights out at night. I experience little to no eye issues concerning my monitor's brightness.

 

On my phone, I use "twilight" to essentially do the same thing and reduce the brightness and colors.

[OhYou_]

none of that matters at all, what matters for eyes is using them.
if you sit in the same position the same distance all day 17 hours a day at your desk and then sleep, your eyes are doing nothing.
they set your focus and then just nothing at all, no change.

the best case is to take tons of tiny 2-3 second breaks throughout your day and just look away from the screen, look out a window, look at distant objects, look at something bright, actually use your eye muscles.
Otherwise they just atrophy and suddenly you struggle to see anything.
Like if you are ever on a road trip or a plane or something and at the end of it you notice that your eyes hurt? That is because you never look at far away objects for long periods of time, your eye muscles are being stressed by something they don't do much. this is a very good sign you need to exercise your vision more.

[Alex Atkin UK]

2 hours ago, manikyath said:

also - i'm of the opinion the "illuminated room" thing is mostly a myth. you want light level to match between the display and the surrounding room. that's ofcourse easiest if the light level is set artificially too, but that doesnt mean it has to be all bright all the time. i find bright rooms straining in general, wether or not a display is involved.

Artificial light is orders of magnitude duller than daylight.  Our eyes are designed for daylight, so of course forcing them to work in much duller conditions is not going to be great for them.  I personally feel I've had much less eye strain as monitors have gotten brighter, the only problem is trying to then match the room lighting as you're basically then needing to light the room like an office.

 

It makes far more sense to try to bring up room lighting to match the monitor than to dull everything down to the point your eyes are actually working harder to focus on a dull screen.

 

Sure its possibly a good idea to go darker as it gets later in the day to match the day/night cycle, but for optimum focus brighter is better IMO.

 

I know a few people who claim they don't like brightly lit rooms and they all suffer migraines.  I suspect rather than them not liking bright because of migraines, I think they got it backwards as they seem to suffer migraines more when they have the rooms dimly lit, but they aren't making that connection.

 

Its also kinda bonkers claiming blue light is bad, when the aim with monitors is to get as close to natural lighting as possible.  So its more the case that a cheap poorly calibrated monitor will cause more problems than a good one.  At least that's my opinion.

 

Worth noting, I find my eyes overly sensitive to daylight and I think that is purely because I spend more time in artificial light - its the fact my eyes are used to a duller environment that causes problems.  I actually feel physically better in brighter lit room, once I've adjusted.

[manikyath]

16 minutes ago, Alex Atkin UK said:

Artificial light is orders of magnitude duller than daylight.  Our eyes are designed for daylight, so of course forcing them to work in much duller conditions is not going to be great for them.  I personally feel I've had much less eye strain as monitors have gotten brighter, the only problem is trying to then match the room lighting as you're basically then needing to light the room like an office.

but we're not designed for 16 hours of daylight either. if OP's sitting in a near-daylight bright room 16 hours per day, maybe this is just built up eyestrain for which the remaining 8 hours dont suffice to recover.

[Alex Atkin UK]

6 hours ago, manikyath said:

but we're not designed for 16 hours of daylight either. if OP's sitting in a near-daylight bright room 16 hours per day, maybe this is just built up eyestrain for which the remaining 8 hours dont suffice to recover.

Which is why I specifically said its probably a good idea to dial it down during the day to simulate a day/night cycle, but just having it duller 24/7 is likely more harmful than keeping it bright at all times.

 

Its more that keeping it bright and particularly blue light can impact your Circadian Rhythm, which is not really about eye strain other than the fact trying to force yourself to stay awake when you're tired will strain your eyes regardless.

 

Personally my Circadian Rhythm has always been messed up and the advice to "don't use a screen right before bed" doesn't seem to impact me at all.  In fact I'm more likely to lay in bed unable to fall sleep if I DON'T watch something on my phone, possibly an anxiety thing where watching videos before sleep keeps my brain from thinking of things that keep me awake.

 

There's too much advice assuming one size fits all, but everyone is different.  I've been given a lot of advice, even by doctors, that just doesn't work for me at all.

[Doobeedoo]

I basically spend as much as well. Make sure you don't squint be it because text is small or display too dark. You need to blink enough to moisturize eyes if itching, if burning same, can use some eye drops to help. 

Also, best rest for eyes from monitor is looking at distance for a while when not looking at monitor, as it lets eyes change focus distance to relax.

[Stahlmann]

Every few hours, step away from your monitors and walk around for about 5 minutes, preferably outside. This will allow your eyes to focus on distant objects and will do wonders for eye fatigue.

 

Other than that, I'd just recommend keeping your monitors at a "reasonable" brightness. Reasonable means not on full blast, but still usable. I personally find that even 100 nits is more than enough for working in daylight, which is 10-30% brightness on most typical monitors.

 

Personally, I'm not a fan of using blue light filters, either in the monitor or as glasses. A normal 6500K white point (which is the standard) is already supposed to mimic noon daylight, so I don't see any reason why that should be harmful to our eyes.

 

Dark modes aren't automatically better than light modes. Whatever helps you read easier is better.