BEIJING, Feb. 29 (Xinhua) -- "Great! It looks exactly the same as my own eye. Now, I have no regrets," exclaimed Champa Yudron, who lost her left eye decades ago, as she tried on her new ocular prosthesis.
Standing beside her, Xintong, a 27-year-old ocularist, shares the joy with this elderly lady who traveled more than 3,000 kilometers from Nyingchi in southwest China's Xizang Autonomous Region to Beijing.
However, without closer observation, one might easily overlook the fact that the young girl who presented Champa Yudron with the new "eye" is herself a one-eyed person who also relies on artificial eyes.
An ocular prosthesis, commonly known as artificial eyes, offers a cosmetic improvement for those who have lost their eyes by using an artificial substitute.
Xintong lost her right eye in a car accident in 2013. After losing an eye, Xintong described her life as plunging into a world of "2.5 dimensions," experiencing a narrower range of vision.
Due to the deterioration of her spatial awareness and three-dimensionality, she mentioned that simple tasks like pouring water into a cup became challenging, watching 3D movies was no longer possible, crossing the street required a 180-degree head turn, and walking too quickly often resulted in collisions with walls.
"I didn't know what to do next," Xintong said, mentioning that she had transformed from being cheerful to consistently feeling melancholic.
To get back to normalcy, she purchased her first ocular prosthesis. However, those mass-produced prostheses were not a good match for her eye. "I found them strange and not attractive," she said.
From then on, the ambition to study and produce prosthetic eyes took root deep within her heart. "At that time, I had a strong conviction to master this craft and assist others like me," she said.
She even gave herself a new name -- "Xintong," which is phonetically similar to the Chinese word for "new eyes."
The process of creating a customized prosthetic eye involves multiple steps, including modeling, shaping the wax mold, attaching the iris, grinding, and polishing, among others. Most of these steps require meticulous handwork.
"A lifelike prosthetic eye is a result of the pursuit of details," Xintong said. Even a slight difference in a few strokes can lead to inaccurate positioning of the iris or color deviation, according to Xintong.
Having only monocular vision, Xintong often damaged materials in the grinding process and encountered difficulties in detaching the fine, fluffy wool used to mimic the red blood filaments of the eyeball.
To improve her skill, Xintong diligently crafted numerous pieces of the prosthetic eye and voluntarily tried them on herself until she found her stride.
"I want to lend a helping hand to those who are in the same predicament as I once was," Xintong said.
Li Hui, who lives in the city of Baoding, in north China's Hebei Province, found Xintong's studio online and customized an ocular prosthesis there about half a year ago.
As a fellow monocular individual, Xintong is better equipped to understand the needs of this group, Li said, adding that his friends commended a lot on his customized artificial eye from Xintong's studio.
Since the studio's establishment, Xintong has customized ocular prostheses for nearly 200 customers from across the country, including Xinjiang, Xizang, Gansu, Heilongjiang, and other regions in China. The customers' age ranges from two to 82 years old.
She has also initiated a charitable effort to provide free ocular prostheses to children in impoverished mountainous regions and military personnel who got injured while on duty.
Being an ocularist has brought Xintong immense fulfillment. "There are those who were once camera-shy but now become enthusiastic about taking selfies with their new prosthetic eyes, and others have found the courage to confess their love after wearing their new prosthetic eyes," she said.
A college student surnamed Qu visited Xintong's studio last summer to customize his prosthetic eye. "The positive energy emanating from Xintong gives me more confidence to enter society after graduation," Qu said.
In her spare time, Xintong dedicates a significant amount of her effort to promoting awareness about prosthetic eyes and the scientific care of eyes through the internet. She also talks to ocularists from around the world about making prosthetic eyes, engaging in topics such as introducing 3D printing for iris production.
This year, she plans to open another studio in Shanghai to expand the scale of prosthetic eye production and serve a wider clientele. "Perhaps it is my destiny to give people like me the chance to see the world with beautiful new 'eyes,'" she said. Enditem
(Zhang Yiting also contributed to the story.)
