Abstract:
A method to train and improve the accuracy of a target shooter. The method checks for the most optimum score for a pattern of shots plotted by the shooter and provide the number of alterations of at least one parameter present on a weapon or a aiming device required to achieve said optimum score along with the score. The method is user friendly, and can give a proper feedback about the accuracy and precision of the shots, so that the shooter can analyze his pattern of shots easily without any assistance from others.

Description:
RELATED APPLICATIONS AND PRIORITY CLAIM 
       [0001]    This application claims priority to Indian provisional application No. 66/DEL/2012 filed Jan. 6, 2012 and Indian non-provisional application No. 66/DEL/2012 filed Feb. 1, 2012. Said applications are incorporated by reference herein in their entirety. 
       FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
       [0002]    The present invention relates to a method to train and improve the accuracy of a target shooter. 
       BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0003]    Shooting is a sport which requires a lot of mental and physical toughness, concentration, and high precision and accuracy skills to get a very high score or to win a match. The object is to hit a spot called the bullseye, i.e. the centre of the target, with high reproducibility to win the game and achieve a high score. In a shooting event, the bullseye from a distance looks like the head of a pin and it is not easy to concentrate for a long duration of time when holding the gun. Thus, the concentration and the skills of a shooter plays important role in achieving a high score and in wining a match. There are a lot of factors that may lead to errors resulting in low scores such as position and stance, breath control, triggering, concentration, lighting, shooter fatigue, and in some events direction and speed of breeze, in a match of shooting or a training session. After continuous practice of shooting for some time there can a fatigue which may lead to lower accuracy results. 
         [0004]    Hence, there is a high demand for a good training method to compensate for the above mentioned problems which will be user friendly, inexpensive, easily understandable, and can give a proper feedback about the accuracy and precision of the shots, so that the shooter can analyze his pattern of shots easily without any assistance from others and can work on the mistakes which lead to poor score and thus, achieve the optimum score. Also, there is a need of a training method which can train the shooter to determine the time of fatigue and thus can provide the amount of alterations required to regain the lost accuracy due to fatigue. 
       SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
       [0005]    It is an object of the invention to provide a method for improving the shooting accuracy of a target shooter in a target system wherein the target system comprises a target having a bullseye and at least one concentric circle about the bullseye, the bullseye is configured to be aimed at and shot at by the target shooter by an aiming device to create a pattern of shots on the target. The method comprises obtaining a pattern of fired shots and plotting the pattern on a virtual target screen, calculating score of the pattern of shots according to position of shots of the plotted pattern and calculating number of rotations of at least one adjustment screw present on the aiming device corresponding to which the score reaches an optimum value. The method of the invention displays the number of rotations along with the corresponding optimum value wherein the number of rotations will aid in improving the accuracy of the target shooter. 
         [0006]    It is another another object of the invention to provide score of the pattern of shots plotted by the shooter on a virtual target screen wherein the score is in direct relation with the proximity of the pattern of shots to the bullseye. 
         [0007]    It is still another object of the invention to provide an optimum score of the pattern of shots plotted by the shooter on the virtual target screen. 
         [0008]    It is still another object of the invention to provide a number of rotations of adjustment screw present on the weapon required to shift the pattern towards the bullseye and obtain the optimum score. 
         [0009]    It is still another object of the invention to provide and display the score of a pattern of shots on the electronic screen and trains the target shooter by providing the number of rotations of an adjustment screw to shift his pattern towards the bulls-eye to obtain a maximum score from a that particular pattern of shots. 
         [0010]    It is still another object of the invention to provide a training module to a shooter to improve his accuracy and target shooting. 
         [0011]    It is still another object of the invention to provide a method which allows the shooter to analyze the variations in target shooting wherein the method comprises creating a set of patterns on the target by shooter and plotting the pattern on a electronic screen; calculating score of the each pattern wherein score is calculated according to position of shots of the pattern on the electronic screen and storing the patterns in a database along with their respecting time of shooting for anlaysing at a later time. The method allows the shooter to select a group of patterns from the stored patterns and to analyze the variations in the selected patterns by comparing the scores of selected patterns together and further, providing a number of rotations of at least one adjustment screw of the weapon wherein the number of rotations can be used by the shooter to shift low score pattern towards position of high score pattern. 
         [0012]    It is still another object of the invention to provide a method to determine time after which shooting accuracy of the target shooter decreases. The method comprises selecting a set of patterns from the stored patterns and determining the time after which shooting accuracy deceasing by comparing the selected patterns scores. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS 
         [0013]    Embodiments of the present invention hereinafter described in conjunction with the appended drawings are provided to illustrate and not to limit the present invention, wherein like designations denote like elements, and in which: 
           [0014]      FIG. 1  illustrates a target for shooting; 
           [0015]      FIG. 2(   a ) illustrates a virtual target screen for plotting the pattern of shots; 
           [0016]      FIG. 2(   b ) illustrates a virtual target screen along with a plurality of buttons; 
           [0017]      FIG. 3  illustrates shifting of the plotted pattern towards centre of the virtual target screen; 
           [0018]      FIG. 4  illustrates the optimum score for the plotted pattern and amount of required alteration of a parameter of an aiming device. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
       [0019]    In the detailed description of the present invention, numerous specific details are described to provide a thorough understanding of the various embodiments of the present invention. However, a person skilled in the relevant art will recognize that an embodiment of the present invention can be practiced without one or more of the specific details, or with other apparatuses, systems, assemblies, methods, components, materials, parts, and/or the like. In other instances, well-known structures, materials, or operations are not specifically shown or described in detail to avoid obscuring aspects of embodiments of the present invention. 
         [0020]    The present invention relates to a method for improving the shooting accuracy and a training method to provide training to a target shooter in a target system to improve the accuracy of shots fired by him. The target system comprises a target comprising a bullseye and at least one concentric circle about the bullseye. The bullseye is configured to be aimed at and shot at by the target shooter by an aiming device to create a pattern of shots on the target. The method improves the consistency of the shooter and trains him to get consistent shots in the high score region i.e. near to bullseye. A Bullseye is a region of a target in shooting that resembles the highest score of the target. The aim of the shooter is to hit the bullseye again and again to achieve the maximum scores. The method of the invention allows the shooter to plot a pattern of shots and then calculates the score of the plotted pattern. The invention checks for the most optimum score that can be achieved for the same pattern and provides the number of alterations of at least one parameter present on an aiming device required to achieve that optimum score and performing further alterations after achieving the optimum value will result in a lesser score than the optimum value. Thus, the shooter can alter at least one parameter of the aiming device to shift his pattern of shots in the high score region and achieve the optimum score from his shooting, thus improving the consistency and the accuracy of the shooter. 
         [0021]    The method also provides a database or a data bank to store or collect different patterns of shots plotted in different or in same sessions which can be reviewed later by the target shooter. The shooter can analyze his plotted patterns later on together to determine the variations in his shooting. The temporal degradation of mental and physical level leads to low accurate results. The shooter can review the patterns plotted at different times to determine the time after which his accuracy decreases and can get the amount of alterations of at least one parameter of the aiming device required to regain his lost accuracy. Thus, by altering the parameter(s) at regular time intervals, he can regain the consistency in his shooting and can obtain high scores. 
         [0022]    There are a lot of aiming devices and weapons which are used for shooting games and events, namely, rifles, handguns, pistols, shotguns etc. A Rifle is a firearm or air-gun with a rifled barrel, but commonly refers to long weapons that usually require two hands to hold and fire steadily. They generally have a longer range and greater accuracy than pistols. Handguns, or Pistols, are smaller than rifles, and are much more convenient to carry in general. They usually have a shorter range and lesser accuracy compared to rifles. A Shotgun is similar to a rifle, but typically fires projectiles that either contains many smaller sub-projectiles, or one large projectile. They are more often than not pump-action or single-shot-and-reload actions. 
         [0023]    The aiming devices and the weapons provided in the above paragraph are used in the various events of shooting including 50-metre rifle three positions, 50-metre rifle prone, 10-metre air rifle, 50-metre pistol, 25-metre pistol, 25-metre rapid fire pistol, 10-metre air pistol etc. Thus, the method of the invention can be used to improve the accuracy of the shooter with any of the weapons or aiming devices and events of shooting without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention. 
         [0024]    The method of the invention corresponds to a target system comprising a target having a bullseye and at least one concentric circle about the bullseye. The bullseye is configured to be aimed at and shot at by the target shooter by an aiming device to create a pattern of shots on the target.  FIG. 1  illustrates a target  101  for shooting. Generally, the target  101  comprises 10 concentric circles symbolizing score. The outermost circle indicates the lowest score and this score increases as the radii of the concentric circles decreases. Therefore, the innermost circle indicates the highest score hence it can be referred to as bullseye here. The target  101  as shown in  FIG. 1  comprises 10 concentric circles. Generally, the shooter tries to focus at the centre of the target  101  i.e. the bullseye of the target and tries to achieve the maximum scores in a match of shooting or a training session but it is not easy to consistently hit the bullseye again and again. So, due to human inaccuracy and various other factors as described earlier the shots may be fired away from the bullseye. The method of the invention described here can be used to provide a level of consistency to the shooter and improve the accuracy of the target shooter to obtain the maximum scores in a match or a training session. 
         [0025]    In an embodiment of the invention, the shooter fires a number of shots during a match of shooting or in a training session on the target  101  and a pattern of shots  202  is created from the shots fired by him and that pattern  202  is obtained and plotted on a virtual target screen  201  as shown in  FIG. 2(   a ). The pattern  202  can be plotted on the virtual target screen  201  with or without the help of grid lines present on the screen  201 . 
         [0026]    In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, an electronic mechanism can be used for recording the pattern of shots  202  fired by the shooter such as a sensor, a camera or any electronic means that can be attached to the target  101 . The recorded pattern that is obtained from the sensor, camera or any other electronic means is plotted on the virtual target screen  201 . 
         [0027]    In another exemplary embodiment of the invention, the virtual target screen  201  can be an electronic screen or a computer screen on which the patterns can be plotted. 
         [0028]    The score  203  of the plotted pattern  202  is calculated according to the position of the shots fired by the shooter and is displayed on the virtual target screen  201  as shown in  FIG. 2(   a ). The shots fired nearer to the centre of the target screen  201  i.e. nearer to the bullseye of the target screen get the higher scores whereas the shots fired farther from the centre of target screen  201  get the lowest scores. The scores of the plotted shots depend on the radii of the concentric circles of the target  101  or virtual target screen  201 . 
         [0029]    In an another embodiment of the invention, the virtual target screen  201  is also accompanied by a plurality of buttons on the right including Ignore button  204 , Optimize button  205 , Delete button  206 , and Reset button  207  as shown in  FIG. 2(   b ). The shooter can ignore the misfired shots by using ignore button  204 , get the final result by using optimize button  205 , delete the wrongly placed shots by using delete button  206 , and reset the pattern by using reset button  207  so that new pattern of shots can be plotted. 
         [0030]    In a further embodiment of the invention, if a shooter misfires some shots then he can ignore the misfired shots by using Ignore button  204 . The method will provide the misfired shots and shooter can check the ignore criteria from the checkboxes  208  as shown in  FIG. 2(   b ). The shooter can manually select, ignore all or ignore none of the shots. After using this feature of the invention calculation of score is done without adding the score of these misfired shots. Optimize button  205  can be used to provide the number of alterations of at least one parameter along with the direction of the alteration. Delete button  206  can be used to delete the wrongly placed shots by the shooter. If the shooter wants to plot new pattern of shots at any point of time then, he can use the reset button  207 , this feature of the invention will take the reset the situation to the plotting of pattern of shots  202 . 
         [0031]    In a further embodiment of the invention, the purpose of the present invention is to improve the shooting accuracy by maximizing the score  203  of the pattern of shots  202  plotted by the shooter. The score  203  of the pattern can be improved by the shifting the pattern of shots  202  towards the bullseye of the virtual target screen  201  or the centre of the virtual target screen  201 . The shifting of the pattern  202  can be done by altering at least one parameter present on the aiming device. 
         [0032]    In a further embodiment of the invention, one of the parameters present on the aiming device used to shift the pattern  202  towards the centre of the virtual target screen  201  is an adjustment screw which can be rotated horizontally or vertically. 
         [0033]      FIG. 3  illustrates shifting of the pattern of shots  202  plotted by the shooter towards the centre of the virtual target screen  201 . The shifted pattern  301  is illustrated in  FIG. 3 . The centre of the virtual target screen  201  consists of smallest radius circle, hence, it is considered the bullseye of the virtual target screen  201  i.e. the highest score region of the virtual target screen  201 . 
         [0034]    In a further embodiment of the invention, optimization of score of the plotted pattern  202  is done by shifting the plotted pattern  202  towards the centre of the virtual target screen  201  by altering the adjustment screw of the weapon or the aiming device and updating the score  203  of the plotted pattern  202 . The shifting of the pattern  202  is done until the updated score reaches to an optimum value. The optimum value is the maximum score value which can be attained for a pattern of shots  202  fired by the shooter. The adjustment screw is rotated either horizontally or vertically to shift the pattern  202  and as the screw is rotated one graduation, the score of the shifted pattern  301  is updated and this updated score is compared with the previous score  203 , if the updated score comes larger than the previously calculated score, then the shifting of plotted pattern  202  continues, whereas, if the updated score comes lesser than the previously calculated score  203 , then the shifting stops. Therefore, the shifting takes place till the updated score of the shifted pattern  301  reaches to its optimum value and performing further rotations of the screw after achieving the optimum value will result in a score less than the optimum value and score will start decreasing after further rotations i.e the pattern will be shifted farther from the bullseye. Initially, the horizontal shifting is done to shift the pattern towards bullseye and when the horizontal optimization is done then vertical shifting takes place to achieve vertical optimization. When the updated score reaches to its optimum value, the amount and direction of vertical rotations  401  and horizontal rotations  402  of the adjustment screw, and the optimum value  403  of the plotted pattern  202  are displayed as shown in  FIG. 4 . This amount of rotations will be used by the target shooter to improve his accuracy. He will come to know that how much rotations of the screw are required to shift his particular pattern in the high score region. Hence, he can train himself and judge his performance and score better in the shooting competitions and training sessions. 
         [0035]    In another exemplary embodiment of the invention, two adjustment screws are present on the weapon or the aiming device including a vertical adjustment screw and a horizontal adjustment screw. The vertical adjustment screw is used for shifting the pattern of shots in upward and downward direction whereas the horizontal adjustment screw is used for shifting the pattern in right and left direction. 
         [0036]    In another exemplary embodiment of the invention, the method of the invention provides two iterative mechanisms or methods for optimizing the score of the plotted patterns, one is the slower mechanism and the other is faster mechanism. The slower mechanism is more accurate mechanism in which the adjustment screw is rotated just one graduation either horizontally or vertically to shift the pattern  202  and as the screw is rotated one graduation, the score of the shifted pattern  301  is updated and this updated score is compared with the previously calculated score  203 , if the updated score comes larger than the previously calculated score, then the shifting of plotted pattern  202  continues, whereas, if the updated score comes lesser than the previously calculated score  203 , then the shifting stops. Therefore, the shifting takes place till the updated score of the shifted pattern  301  reaches to its optimum value. The faster mechanism is less accurate mechanism in which the adjustment screw is rotated five graduations directly either horizontally or vertically to shift the pattern  202  and as the screw is rotated five graduations, the score of the shifted pattern  301  is updated and this updated score is compared with the previously calculated score  203 , if the updated score comes larger than the previously calculated score, then the shifting of plotted pattern  202  continues, whereas, if the updated score comes lesser than the previously calculated score  203 , then the shifting stops. Therefore, the shifting takes place till the updated score of the shifted pattern  301  reaches to its optimum value. In both the mechanisms, initially the horizontal shifting is done to shift the pattern towards bullseye and when the horizontal optimization is done then vertical shifting takes place to achieve vertical optimization. When the updated score reaches to its optimum value, the amount and direction of vertical rotations  401  and horizontal rotations  402  of the adjustment screw, along with the optimum value  403  of the plotted pattern  202  are displayed as shown in  FIG. 4 . The optimum score is one after which if the screw is rotated further, score of the pattern starts decreasing and this optimum score corresponds to the maximum score of the particular pattern. The amount of rotations will be used by the target shooter to improve his accuracy. 
         [0037]    For shifting 1.2 mm of the pattern from a distance of 10 meters, 1 graduation movement is required i.e. advancement of the said parameter is one. Therefore, a movement of the graduation or 1 click is required to shift the pattern 1.2 mm from a distance of 10 meters. The extent of shift may vary with the weapon or the aiming device and the relevant distance. However, the invention provides for accommodating such variations. In a further embodiment of the invention, the plotted patterns by the shooter during a match or a training session can be stored in a database or a data bank. Later, he can analyze the shooting patterns fired by the shooter at different times to know the variations in his shooting and thus, can train himself by correcting these mistakes which lead to low score results. For example, if a shooter fires a set of shots on a target over different sessions/days and plots the patterns in the virtual target screen the present invention will store the different patterns plotted by the shooter in its database which can be later reviewed by the shooter. Temporal degradation of mental and physical level may lead to lower accuracy, which could emerge as a pattern. Thus, by reviewing the plotted patterns together he can determine the time interval in which his accuracy decreases and can get the amount of alterations of the adjustment screws with the directions required to regain the same accuracy. According to the result, by rotating the adjustment screws present on the weapon or the aiming device at a regular interval of time he can regain the same accuracy and can obtain high scores. 
         [0038]    In a further embodiment of the invention, the database of the plotted patterns can be useful to determine the improvement of the shooting accuracy of the shooter. The method of present invention stores the plotted patterns and their results along with the time of shooting. By reviewing the analyses of the plotted patterns the shooter can determine the accuracy and can work on it to win the match or to get high scores. 
         [0039]    In a further embodiment of the invention, a training method is provided to train the shooter to replenish the consistency of high accurate shots and to improve the accuracy of the shooter. There are a lot of factors that may lead to errors resulting in low scores such as position and stance, breath control, triggering, concentration, lighting, shooter fatigue, and in some events direction and speed of breeze, in a match of shooting or a training session. 
         [0040]    The invention trains the shooter to alter at least one parameter present on the weapon or the aiming device so that after a particular point of time he is able to regain the consistency of high accurate shots which was lost due to various factors. The training method provided by the invention trains the shooter to achieve the optimum score, thus regains the consistency and accuracy by allowing the shooter to plot a pattern of shots and calculating the score of the pattern. The method checks for the most optimum score for the same pattern and provide the number of alterations of at least one parameter present on a weapon or an aiming device required to achieve that optimum score. Thus, the shooter can alter at least one parameter of the weapon or the aiming device to shift his pattern of shorts in the high score region and achieved the desired results. 
         [0041]    Although the invention herein has been described with reference to particular embodiments, it is to be understood that these embodiments are merely illustrative of the principles and applications of the present invention. It is therefore to be understood that numerous modifications may be made to the illustrative embodiments and that other arrangements may be devised without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention as defined by the appended claims.