Learning to use your new CCTV is easy. If you follow these instructions your satisfaction and productivity will be greatly enhanced.

First, you need to understand that most seniors who use CCTVs need to wear clip-on lenses to help their eyes focus. These clip-on lenses clip onto your glasses and aid your eyes by focusing the image onto your retina. Since seniors have a condition called presbiopia they need extra lenses to reverse the effects of this condition. I am aware that many seniors with macular degeneration don't even wear their glasses any more. Even if the glasses don't help significantly to see into the distance, your eyes need help to focus on things up close. Your glasses and the clip-on lenses together give your eyes the best corrected vision for using your new CCTV. I sell these clip-on lenses on this site. The only people who don't need them are people who are younger or who are normally near sighted by about 1.5 diopters. Seniors who never wore glasses for distance vision may use store bought reading glasses. Purchase the ones that are 1.5 diopters.

Your comfort and productivity are going to be enhanced by making sure you are positioned properly in front of your CCTV. Make sure that you are looking directly at the monitor. If the monitor is too high you will develop a kink in you neck and this will make you uncomfortable. If this is the case you can either put the CCTV on a adjustable height table or mount the monitor to the side. We sell an adjustable height table through this website. If you want to put the monitor to the side follow these instructions.

If you are setting up your CCTV side by side then you will now want to assemble the legs onto the monitor tray. Use the four screws and the wing nuts to put these three pieces together. When setting up the CCTV side by side you will want to place the camera just to the right of center (if you are right handed).

If you decided to put the monitor to the side. You may place the tray, with the attached legs, to the left of the camera. You will want these two parts of the CCTV close together. Position the tray (with legs) so that its right side is next to the left side of the camera. The place where they meet should be directly in front of where you will sit. Now you may place the monitor on top of the tray. The monitor and the camera should be facing you. This way they are at an angle to each other. They are not facing straight toward the front of the table.

Now there is one more ergonomic issue. It is possible to raise your position in front of the CCTV. If you buy an adjustable height office chair with arms you will be able to adjust the proper height. There are some other advantages to having a good chair to sit in. First, if you get one with arms on it you will be able to rest your arms and steady your self while moving the XY table. Second, you will be able to move toward the front of your CCTV easily because the chair has wheels on it. Also the chair swivels so you can get it close to the CCTV and still get in and out of it without having to move the chair back and forth in front of you CCTV.

Remember you can always move the CCTV monitor and the camera around to make your work station comfortable. Now that you are comfortable lets get to reading with your CCTV.

Reading with your CCTV. There is a reading material edge on the back of the XY table. This raised edge is there so you can place your reading material on your XY table all the way to the back. Doing so will align your reading material perpendicular to the camera. This is important because as you move the XY table left to right and then back to the left your reading material will stay aligned properly and this is important to keeping your place. There are three controls on the XY table. The two on the front are margin stops. These can be moved apart or together. They are tightened down during shipping and will need to be released when you first use your CCTV. They can be positioned to align up with a column on your document. They can also be used to lock the tray down for when you are writing. The other control is found on the lower right hand corner of the XY table. This is used to either adjust the tension on the in and out motion of the XY table or for locking down the XY table. Use this control know to put just enough tension on the XY table so that the XY table has just enough tension on it so that it only moves when you want it to. If this is set too loose the XY table may involuntarily move. This can cause trouble because the copy will move on the monitor when you want it to stay stationary. You will know when this has enough tension on it when the XY table will need to be pushed in and out to get the copy to move up and down the monitor. Since this tension control know is under the right side it is often over look. It is locked down when shipped. You will need to loosen this knob by turning it toward you. If you want to write on your CCTV you will want to tighten this tension control. Just turn the knob away from you until lightly tight.

If you are reading a book or some other material that doesn't lay flat you will want to put the enclosed sheet of plexiglas on top of the reading material. This will hold the pages down so that the camera can more easily focus on them. If your book is really thick and you are looking at the open side that is thin, this side should be shimmed up so that those pages are the same height as the pages on the thick side. This may be accomplished by shimming up the thin side with another book. The objective here is to have each page (the one on the left and the one on the right of the binding) be level with one an other.

Now adjust the size of your text. Use the size knob (the large one just left of center) to adjust the size of your reading material. Since you will be moving the XY table to position each word under the camera it is important to have the size of your text be about twice as big as it is when stationary. One common issue for beginners is to have the text just big enough to see while the text is stationary. Then when they start to read they have trouble seeing the moving text clearly. Simply adjust the text so that it is large enough to read while moving the tray. Otherwise you will have to stop to read the text after moving it.

The more severe your vision loss the more you will need to practice eccentric fixation. This means looking off center. Remember your central vision is what is most effected by macular degeneration. The vision just near your effected vision is your best vision. You will want to learn to use this vision. Practice looking at the screen with text on it. Adjust the size so you can read some words. Now the objective here is to move your blind spot out of the way. Since you have always look directly at what you want to see this will take some wilful intervention. Although conditions vary and you should experiment to find out if you meet the norm, most people will see best if they look just below the mid-line of the text. Since the top part of each letter reveals more information about a letter than does the bottom of that letter, if you are going to have your blind spot interfere with seeing a part of the letter it is better to miss some of the bottom of the letter than the top. The idea here is to move your blind spot just enough out of the way so that it is between the lines of text. When you have reached this optimum view technique you will be able to read along at a rate similar to reading aloud. It is not possible to read as fast as you use to. It is possible to read well enough to enjoy books and comprehend what you have read. It usually takes several hours to fully develop this technique.

How will you know if you are reading as well as you can? Ask yourself, can I see the text? Is there anything missing? If you answer yes to the first question and no the second question then you have experienced the true power and potential of a Reliant CCTV. This is accomplished with a combination of several factors. First and foremost you have established a virtual fovea. The fovea is the central part of the retina. The macula is located in the fovea. Since your macular degeneration is effecting your fovial (central) vision you need to use the healthy parts of your retina as though they were your macula. Since the vision loss is most likely not exactly the same in both eyes, your good vision in one eye is supporting the vision loss in the other eye and visa versa. This can only be accomplished with the CCTV type of magnifier since any simple lens magnifier, over the power of 3X, requires the exclusive use of just one eye.

Now there are some other issues common to those with macular degeneration. Many people with macular degeneration are light sensitive. All the Reliant CCTVs have standard a negative text mode. This function is controlled by the left hand knob. This knob pulls out to turn on the negative text mode. This makes the text and back ground reversed. It makes it look like a negative. The normal black text on a white background will now appear as white text on a black background. This high contrast negative mode is particularly useful for those persons who are more light sensitive because the black background is easier on their eyes then the white background. For those whose light sensitivity is still aggravated even when the Reliant CCTV is in the negative mode they should purchase the Custom Color Option. This Custom Color Option allows for a variety of different color combinations that are high contrast both in positive and negative. What would other wise be white light is replaced with either blue, green, red, yellow or violet. How do you know if you should use the negative mode? Ask your self if you can see it better? If you can then learn to use your CCTV in the negative mode. Doing so will improve your productivity.

Using the XY table. The XY table is designed to make moving your text under the camera easier. Take a few hours to learn how to use it. Once you have mastered this technique you will be more able to keep you place. Start by placing your text up against the back of the XY table. There is a raised lip there. This document guide orients your text perpendicular to the axis of the CCTV camera. After you get everything to your own preferences (your proper size, level and positive or negative mode) you are ready to beguine. Start with the upper left hand corner of your document in the upper left hand corner of the CCTV screen. Move the XY table with our right hand while sliding it through your left hand. Use your left hand as a break. Adjust your left hand's tension on the XY table so that the table move in a manner consistent with your own reading level. Just a light touch with one finger on the front edge is usually sufficient. Rest you left hand on the table and push the XY table past it. Your right hand will move with the XY table. Move the XY Table to your left. This will move the text to the left under the camera revealing the text to the right. When you get to the right margin move the XY table back to the right.

This is a good time to blink. Your eyes need to stay moist and blinking will give them a fresh layer of tear film. If you don't blink enough your eyes will get irritated and may even get blood shot. You will want to avoid this so remember to give your eyes a break every ten minutes or so and blink about every seven seconds. Do not move the tray toward you until you have read the line of text at the bottom of the screen. Once you have read the last line of text on the screen you may first return to the beginning of that line then pull the XY table toward you enough to move the line of text you just read up off the top of screen. Now you will have several lines of text to read again before you have to move the XY table toward you. This way you move the XY table toward you only when you have read a whole screen of text.

The alternative is not as productive a method. In this method, one reads the first whole screen then moves the XY table toward them just enough to reveal one new line of text at a time and then continues to do so until the whole column is read. This method requires that the person move the XY table toward them selves once for every line of text after the initial first full screen. Some people like to use the bottom of the screen as a guide. If you prefer to do this that is your choice. However then you are not fully utilizing the whole screen. You will be predominantly using only the bottom of the screen. If your CCTV is too high and you you can't use the alternative of lowering the CCTV or moving it to the side then you could use this method for ergonomic reasons.

There are margin stops on the front of your XY table. These are used to assist the side to side motion of your XY table. In the event that you are reading something with columns and you want to keep from accidentally moving across a column, then the margin stops are the tool for you. They can be positioned to align with the margins of the column. Once they are in place tighten them down. Now when you move the XY table from side to side the table will automatically stop when it gets to the edge of the column. Once you have read one column you can re-position the next column to correspond with the already adjusted margin stops.

If you are going to write, take the friction brake knob and tighten it down. Now take the margin stops and move them together and tighten them down. Put your ruled paper onto the XY table. The rules should be at an angle. This angle is approximately from the lower left hand corner of the screen to the upper right hand corner of the screen. This angle varies from person to person. You will know if your rule angle is comfortable because you will be better able to write between the lines. If you are writing up off the line then rotate the lines counter clockwise. If you are consistently writing down off the line then rotate the lines clockwise. Hold the paper with your left hand and move it toward you left elbow when you need to see more of your line. Write several words at a time and stop when you get to the edge of the screen. Now move the paper just far enough to write again. Start in the lower right hand corner and write a few more words. Practice at first making X's and O's. It takes about a half an hour to master this technique. Try to relax and take several attempts at it. Two or three sessions of about ten minutes will be all it takes. It may be important to get bold line paper. This paper has heavier lines on it and these lines are much easier to see than college ruled paper. Also a positive flow pen will make a better (and easier to read) mark. Cheep pen's marks are variegated and when magnified are not as clear as a good pen that makes a solid line. The pen does not need to be a bold marker. Bold markers will make writing difficult because the letters will run together. If you are only writing a check it may not be necessary to lock down the XY table.

Remember, if you still have any questions, you may either contact us via e-mail or call customer service at 1 - 800 - 473 - 3195.