When you are doing foreshortening of an object which is pretty close to you - do you look at it with both eyes open, or do you close one eye? And if you do close one eye do you choose the view that looks easier to draw?!

This happened to me today. I was drawing my desk lamp which for obvious reasons was less than a foot away from me. Looking at the part that needed to be foreshortened with both eyes opened made me see double - literally. So I had to do it with one eye closed. Of course when you close your eyes alternately the image hops here and there!

I ended up drawing the view that appeared easiest to represent.

Do you do crazy things like this too?!

Not yet happened to me, or did not notice it. If I draw something, next time I would like to try it.

Rose, shutting one eye to view an object and using the thumb as a measurement is used often by artists. Open both eyes and look at an object, you now have binocular vision and can see the object and the space around it.

Now using your thumb as the starting point of a measurement, close one eye, noting where your thumb is on the object. Open that eye and close the other. You will find that your thumb has moved from the object most likely in one or the other eye, compared to when you see the object with both eyes open.

When the thumb stays in the same line of sight that it was in when you used both eyes, it indicates that the eye you use is your dominant eye.

Closing an eye blocks out extraneous material and allows you to concentrate on the object. Using your thumb as a measuring tool allows you to get a basic proportion in place of features. Most people draw an object using both eyes to allow a full view, and shut one eye only when measuring.

Oh great Jeanette! So I'm not really as crazy as I thought I was!

You've explained it very well... and according to your explanation my left eye is my dominant eye... keeping it open while closing the right eye the thumb stays in more or less the same position as when I have both my eyes open.

So now when I metaphorically want to close an eye I should be closing the left!! That way I really won't see what I don't want to see!