April 3, 2023 • 42 mins
Mark Miller, host, and Dara Golding, producer, speak with Christina King, an ocularist at the Center for Ocular Prosthetics in Portland.
Today, they talk about the unexpected paths Christina’s career has taken as she always seeks to improve her skills. And how she came to create both fantastical “fun eyes” and realistic eye prosthetics. Learn about:
- How she made her first fun eye (a prosthetic with a gold iris!) for Rachel Mackenzlee and how this led to going viral
- How she and Rachel started a fund to help people pay for fun eyes
- The medical and artistic sides of creating eye prosthetics
- Why Christina will soon be sitting between two giant eye sculptures at a conference
- What Hollywood gets wrong about prosthetic eyes
- And how painting tricks can make painted pupils look like they’re expanding and contracting!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
(uplifting music)
- Welcome to TPGi's
"Real People, Real Stories" podcast,
where you'll find interestingand diverse stories
from folks working to make theworld a more inclusive place.
Hey, welcome to "Real People,Real Stories" podcast,
brought to you by TPGi.
I'm your host, Mark Miller,
(00:21):
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So welcome, everybody.
Thank you for joining us.
We've got a really funshow, I think, ahead here.
I want to first introduceDara, my co-host.
(00:42):
And she found a really, really fun person
for us to talk to today.
So I'd like to welcomeChristina King to the podcast.
Hi, Christina, how are you?
- I'm great. (laughs)
- You're great.
Perfect.- I'm great.
- So (laughs) that's good.
It's good to establishthat we're all great.
The first thing I wanted...
(01:03):
Can you just, you kind of have this,
I'm just gonna call itlike a really fun idea
for fundraising that you came up with,
and I think that that's what Dara,
is the reason she reached out to you
because it was just so quirkyand cool and fun and all that.
Can you tell us a little bit
about why you're trying to raise funds,
(01:23):
and then the way that you do it,
this really fun way that you do it?
- Yeah, absolutely.
So I had met Rachel Mackenzlee,
I think it was probably alittle over two years ago.
- Mm-hmm.
- And she'd come to mefrom another ocularist,
and usually when you're with an ocularist
you're kind of like married to them,
'cause you develop likethis amazing bond with them.
(01:44):
You share their story, their life.
And so, she was really nervewrecked to leave her ocularist.
And especially for someonewho's, like, younger
and maybe not as, like,knowledgeable, she wasn't sure.
And so, she came to me and we made an eye.
She was amazing,
'cause I had someone running late that day
and they actually,
she waited like three hours
'cause the person was three hours late.
- Mm-hmm.- Go figure.
(02:06):
So she hung around, and afterwe met and I made her an eye,
she said she was, like, from"One-Eyed and Wonderful."
And I said, "Oh my gosh,didn't you have blonde hair?"
And we're just kinda likediscussing all this stuff,
and we had all these common interests.
I'm into plants and, like,tattoos, and all sorts of stuff.
And she kind of had the same interests.
So we kept talking and she said,
(02:26):
"You know, I'd reallylike, like, a fun eye."
(Mark laughing)
But she's like, "I'm nervous."
She wanted like a gold iris.
So I literally got, like,24 caret gold flakes
and I laid it out,
and I made her her first gold eye.
I just made it 'cause I didn't know
if I should be charging or what.
I just was like,
"This could be really cool tojust see in someone's socket."
(02:47):
And I'm, like, here for that.
And she got it, and she kind of was like,
"I wish I went, like, full gold."
Or, "I wish I, like,did something bigger."
So we started developingall these different eyes
and designs and, like,really getting into it.
And eventually, it's obviouslycaught on with social media,
people are seeing her post,
which leads them back to me,
(03:09):
and which led to thislittle girl, Gracie, last,
I want to say last summer.
And she wanted an eye.
And at that time I think I wascharging like, I don't know,
like 300 or something.
Way under rate.
'Cause most eyes, welllet's talk about price.
They're usually like, I don't know,
four grand to I'veheard as much as 10,000.
(03:29):
I think ours, through insurance,
are like between 5 and 6,000.
The insurance does not always pay that,
but that's what we charge.
And, of course, I always have cash prices
for people who just can't afford it.
I am like a bleedingheart, so I can't help it.
But she decided to dothis fundraiser for like,
(03:50):
she was like, "I don't know,maybe we could help raise money
for this little girl named Gracie."
And we did.
And within the first hour she was like,
I told her 300, and she was like,
"Let's ask for 500."
And I was like, she's like,
'cause they take minimumof like 10 hours to make.
So they're labor intensive.
- Right.
- Whether they're fun or regular.
Yeah, go ahead.
(04:12):
So we raised the money withinan hour and we were like,
"Why aren't we helping more people?"
So we kind of just were like,"Let's keep this going."
- Wow.
- And before I knew it,
it was kind of wild 'cause there was,
there's actually like a podcast called...
What is it?
"Not Your Mom's House"or something like that.
Or "Your Mom's House."
(04:32):
And the lady, Christina, was amazing.
She donated like $5,000. Like-
- Oh, no way.- Completely nice.
Like, and we're actuallysigned up to go see her.
She's gonna be in townat the end of March.
So we're really excited,
because for every 500 we'vedecided to make a fun eye.
There's a little criteria for that.
And so far, I actually just added it up,
(04:53):
we've made like 30 eyes so far.
- Of the fun eyes?- So it's been helping people.
- Of, like, the extra-- Yeah, yeah.
- Wow.
- Yeah. And we actuallyhave, which is amazing,
we actually have, of all of those,
we have like, I thinkthere's still like 150 people
signed up for a fun eyethat can't afford one.
So I think it's just kindof cool to see, like,
all of the interests around the world.
(05:15):
And, like, working with all these people,
it's really cool to seethem happy and excited,
and it's like a sense of closure
and, like, healing that you won't,
you know, I guess I didn't see happening.
And when I started to see that,
I think Rachel and I kinda, like,
looked at each other and we're like,
"Do you see the lightbeaming from their faces?
We're gonna do this."
- Wow.- Like, it's game on.
(05:36):
- And it seems like it kind of ended up
sort of doubling up on itself in a way
in the sense that, you know,you created this scenario
where people wanted todonate all this money,
but then with your kindof fun eye, I don't know,
incentive, right, you're also-
- Yeah.
- you're kind of donating,
or like making an agreement with everybody
(05:58):
that I'm gonna give back, too,
as much as you give backwith these fun eyes.
And then now you have like double,
I guess double the eyesor something just about-
- Yeah.- that are coming out.
- Yeah.
- Do people, like how many people...
Are they excited about these fun eyes?
They're wearing these fun eyes?
(06:19):
Do they wear them all the time?
Do they wear them when they go out?
Like, how does that work?- Yeah.
So the most depressing iswhen, like, I make them,
if they're in office,
they happen to come in for a normal eye.
I've gotten a lot morebookings where it's like,
"We want to come in for our normal eye,"
which is paid through insurance,
but then, "We also wantto get a separate fun eye.
Could we sign up at the same time?"
(06:39):
And so we're booking, like, doubles kinda.
And there's also people thatwill, like, write me and say,
"We want a fun eye."
They'll schedule to come out or, you know,
or give me their eye to copy,'cause that's all I need.
And they, like, they don'teven know what they want.
So it's just the idea ofChristina's making this.
(07:00):
- (indistinct)
- I don't care what she makes,I'm gonna rock her design.
- Yeah.
- And I've also gotten, like,
some creative freedom on a few of them,
so I'm really excited for that.
So they're like, "Well, thisis kind of what we're into,
and this is what we like."
So it's like a tattooartist, but for your eyeball.
- Yeah, I was gonna say thatit's like you're an artist-
- Yeah.
- and people want your creation
(07:21):
as much as they just want something new,
which has gotta feel fantastic, right?
- Yeah. Oh, it definitely does.
But, well, the sad partis when they, like,
get their normal eye andthen they end up going,
"We're not wearing it."
Like, "Sorry you spent15 hours making this.
We like the fun eyes."
And they, like, toss it aside.
- The fun eye's more fun.
That's why you wear the fun eye.
(Dara and Mark laughing)- Yeah, yeah.
(07:41):
Well, and they get to choose
when people know thatthey have a fake eye.
So I was just like, "This is kinda great."
Yeah.
- Well, and I wanted to ask,
so I've seen a bit ofthe clips on your TikTok
of you making them a bit.
So could you walk us throughthe process of making say,
let's talk about, like, thesparkly one you made for
Rachel Mackenzlee with allof the little crystals in it.
(08:04):
Can you talk through the processof how that eye gets made?
What goes into that 10 hours?- Yeah.
So the process startswith molding the eye,
which I grabbed a few things.
I thought this would come up.
I will have, usually, a wax shape
depending on whatever shape their eye is,
or their existing eye thatI can copy if it fits well.
(08:25):
And then that actuallygoes into a two part mold.
And I pack that with whiteplastic and I grind it all down.
And I actually do multiple layers.
That's why I think it, like,gets very blingy looking.
In fact, when I gave her herreally Swarovski crystal one,
I said, "Careful."
'Cause it was, like,the sun was going down.
(08:46):
I was like, "Do not stareat that rear view mirror
while you're driving home,because you will crash."
'Cause even in our room it was,like, reflecting everywhere.
- Wow.
- So it was really fun to watch.
And she goes, "No way."
So what I do is I'll grindit down to the white layer.
Recently I've been using,
actually it's like a nail flake,
and it's like an iridescent color.
(09:07):
So I'll go all the way to the edges,
'cause I think it's important to, like,
fill the entire space.
And I have one here that I'm working on,
and it actually, yeah,they're really sparkly.
So I'll layer it,
and I'll do a second coatwhere I'll cut it down
kinda like halfway afterI do the first layer.
And then I'll add morecrystals on top of that
(09:29):
so they kind of, like,reflect off of each other.
So it turns out really pretty.
- And I just want todescribe that a little bit,
'cause some of our audience
may be without vision completely.
So what Christina just showed
is almost like a round cut crystal
with a lot of differentangles in the crystal to it.
And I can completelyunderstand what you mean
(09:51):
about light refracting allover the place because-
- Yeah.- I think at some point
when I was in fifth grade,
we sold the little crystalsthat hang off a string
and spin around that people would put
in their rear view mirrors and stuff,
and they would create these prisms-
- Oh, yeah.- and colors and stuff
that would shine lightthrough all over the place.
(10:12):
So that's very fun and cool.
- Mm-hmm.
Yeah.- So didn't mean to interrupt.
- They're a blast to make.- Please keep going,
but I wanted to make sure that,
I know we have a lot ofpeople without vision.
- No, you're good.
- So if you're showing cool stuff,
I want to make sure thatthey know what it looks like.
So is there anything more to the process,
or does that pretty much cover it?
- Oh, so yeah, so I coatit a couple of times.
(10:34):
I do individualized cooks.
- So the first time that I process it,
each time I, you know, I say cook,
but it's processing for two hours,
I usually grind them down.
The mold making itselfis maybe half hour or so
once I get everythingset, the plastic set.
Then it's a two hour process to cook,
another half hour to grind down
and prep for another painting.
(10:55):
So if it requires doublethe painting or layers,
I do it again.
So that adds, you know,four, eight, you know,
like it just adds up.
- It's going, yeah.
- Yeah. If I'm physically painting,
which I'm in front ofmy painting table now,
it could be an hour to two hours.
I've spent three to four hours painting.
And then it processes again.
(11:17):
And then when I...
So that's another twohours and I grind it down.
And then there's, like, thefinal little adjustments,
which could take up to an hour.
So it adds up.
It definitely does.
And the fun eyes are doneon top of normal work.
So, yeah.
- (laughs) So it's almost like this cycle
of how they get made, basically,
where you're going throughsimilar steps over and over
until there's a finished product.
(11:40):
- Yep.- It's like making a-
- Exactly, exactly.- a katana, right?
Like, just keep folding themetal until you're done, right?
- Yep.
- Tons and tons and tons of time.
- Eventually it'll come to.
- Yeah.- Yeah, exactly.
- So this is what I'm reallywondering about, right,
because I've got this image in my head
of these people nowwalking around with one eye
(12:01):
that is just, like, nuts, right?
Like something thatyou've never seen before.
Do your, I don't know,what do you call them?
Patience? Clients?
- Clients.- Clients.
- I don't like patients.- Yeah.
- 'Cause they've dealtwith the doctors already.
- So do your clients ever-
What's that?
- Yeah.
I said they've dealt with doctors already.
I'm like, "No, they're clients."
(12:22):
- Clients, right.
- 'Cause we end up being friends usually.
- Friends. (laughs)
- Yeah, that's it.
It's fine.
- So do your patient/client/friends,
do they come back and,like, tell you stories of,
you know, what it's likewhen they walk around,
you know, they go to themall or they, you know,
filling up their gas tank,
(12:43):
they're going out todinner with the fun eye.
(Christina laughing)
Like, what kind of reactions,and what do people say and do?
- Yeah.
Well, between the actualreactions from the clients
themselves and then online,
the online community's crazy.
Like, Rachel will come back and be like,
"I just went to Target."
(13:04):
And she goes, "Thislady stops me and goes,
'You're the girl.
Like, oh my God,
you're wearing yourSwarovski crystal eye.'"
Or, "You're wearing your new-"
- Oh my gosh, she was recognized.
- "(indistinct) eye."
They know her.
Or they'll go through our coffee shop,
oh my gosh, one of the local coffee shops,
and they go like, "Quick, come here."
And they'll, like, pulleveryone aside and be like,
"Look, it's Rachel, it's Rachel."
(13:25):
Like, they know.
Or, like, the little kids that I feature,
they're definitely,like, spotted, you know?
So it's kind of interesting or, I mean,
and then there's also likethe social media aspect where,
like, it'll take on a life of its own.
Like, I just featured, like, a gold eye
that had a diamond in it,like right in the center,
and, like, one of thebiggest comments were like,
(13:46):
"Illuminati."
And you're like, "What?"
- Oh, that's funny.(Dara laughing)
- Well, and it goes to Illuminati
because at the top of theeye, what you don't see,
is it's a triangle and eyeball,
but then there's a circle and, like,
it was just like, youdon't see the most of it,
you just see the triangle and the eye.
And he didn't ask for it.
I just was like, "I don't know,let me put a symbol up top
(14:07):
so he knows where the top is."
But it took on a whole new life.
- That's great.
- Yeah, and they're like,
"That man is gonna get hiseyeball stolen from him."
And I'm like, "It's like a $40diamond. It's nothing big."
- Right.(Dara laughing)
And hopefully if it's stolen,
it's, like, out of hishouse while he's at work
and not directly out of his eye.
(14:29):
- Unfortunately, they would be like,
"Oh, he's gonna getrobbed for his eyeball."
- Oh, I hope not.
That would be awful.
(Christina laughing)
- Yeah, social mediacomments are an experience.
- Oh, they are, they are. (laughs)
- And I feel like you shouldalmost collect the stories.
Like, you've gotta have somany stories that come up,
(14:50):
and there's gotta bestories you don't even hear.
Part of your social mediashould just be, like,
how the public reacts tothese eyes because it's-
- Well, yeah, I'mactually working on that.
I have something,
I have a conference coming up
with a whole bunch of one-eyed members,
but the bigger thing that I'm featuring is
(15:10):
I'm getting two 16 incheyeballs in diameter
that are like thesehyper realistic eyeballs.
So I'm actually gonna dokind of a spoof of, like,
"Between Two Ferns,"
but it's gonna be called"Right Between the Eyes."
- Oh, that's good.
- So two eyeballs.
And I get to do a Q&A with,you know, the clients-
- That's a great idea.
- or I'm gonna bring doctors in and, like,
(15:32):
we can address, like, either the stories,
how they lost their eye,like all sorts of stuff,
which I think is gonna be really cool
to, like, have a place to check out.
And also for people alsogoing through, like, eye loss,
like a place to, you know, check back,
like how eyes are made orhow things are done or, like,
just to know a little bit of the process
before they get into it.
(15:52):
- So, yeah.- Yeah.
- What really strikes me aboutjust your whole story here,
Christina, is thatyou've taken something...
Like, nobody wants to lose an eye.
That's a negative thingthat if you ask anybody,
they'd be like,
"Yeah, I'd rather keepit, thank you." You know?
(16:12):
And you've turned it aroundinto something, not just fun,
but something that is, like, unique.
Almost, I don't know if theword advantage is right,
but just something that-- (laughs) Yeah.
- is unique and expressive that a person
who only has one eye can now do.
(16:33):
And that can be like a just...
They can be individual insteadof looking at that as like,
"Oh, you know, I lost an eye,and I'm just gonna replace it
and try to look."
- They're in their own little class.
- They're own their ownlittle class, and it's-
- Yeah, they're own cool club.
Yeah, that's it.- Yeah. It's cool club.
(Christina laughing)
It's beyond, "Can yougive me a replacement
so that I look normal?
Like, so I fit into thesocietal kind of norm
(16:56):
of having two eyes." Right?
To, "I'm gonna take itone step above that,
and I'm actually goingto look cool." Right?
"I'm gonna do something that's-"
- Yes, yes.
- So I think it's just...
And I know that that's notwhat you set out to do,
but based on your-
- Yeah.- fun personality
and the heart that you had that created
(17:18):
and that followed this path, you know,
starting with that one, you know,
kid that you were talking about.
That's what came out of it, right?
Which is an interestingthing in and of itself
that it doesn't have to be anidea you bring to fruition.
It can be you justfollowing your personality
and who you are and yourinstincts and what seems right.
(17:39):
- Right.
- And it blows up into this amazing thing.
I just love it.
I just love the way...
It's kind of the ultimatenegative into a positive story.
And in the funnest way, right?
- Exactly.
- Not just like, "Oh, this is a positive."
But it's just fun.
It's nothing but pure funand glitz and glamour.
And you've got these...
(18:00):
People are turning into celebrities,
you're turning into a celebrity.
- Yeah. (laughs)
- In the funnest sense of all that.
And I just think it's wonderful.
- Yeah.
Yeah, one thing I-- Well, and actually-
- Oh, go ahead, sorry.
I cut you off.
- Oh, you go first andthen I'll ask something.
- I was gonna say the coolest part,
not only are they, like, doing these eyes,
not only are they fun,
it's, like, super therapeutic.
So another thing I like to do is
(18:23):
I go with my friend,Sarah, who's a therapist,
and I like to, like, go tosome of the therapy classes
where they teach and just see, like,
what makes someone feelgood about themselves.
So in a way, I kind of bringthat into my own situation.
Because most people that lose their eye,
whether they realize it or not,
they've been through trauma.
Because the removal itself,
especially between COVID and, like,
(18:44):
everyone having their,you know, faces covered,
you're looking at your eyes,
and ultimately that's-- I didn't even think of that.
- Yeah, you make, like,eye contact with people.
So it's really hard forsomeone who either, like,
has had an eye, or an eye thathasn't fit well or look good,
'cause they're with,whatever eye they get,
they have it for like five years
before they're approved for another one.
(19:05):
It's just nice for them tofeel good about it, too.
Eyes are so important.
You know, it's thefirst thing you wake up,
you look in the mirror.
The first thing people lookat when they look at you.
So if you feel good about itand you could put that out,
it's really nice to see that as, like,
a confidence booster, too.
So it's been really cool tosee that, like, come through.
And also, when I happen to get people
(19:26):
like Rachel Mackenzlee and,like, Miss Sunshine together,
we did that in October.
I saw this really cool, like,
bonding that they had between each other.
They lost their eyes different ways,
but they both happened tobe the left eye, anyway,
so they, like, bonded.
And that's kind of why I'mthrowing this little, like,
eyeball party. (laughs)
(19:47):
Because it's really helpful.
Yeah, I think there's, like, a way it...
They really are a one-eyed gang.
- So, yeah.- I think one of the
important things that yousaid there, too, is like,
we always think of sightbeing so important,
which it is, right?
Like, again-- Yeah.
- nobody would choose to lose their sight.
- Exactly.
- But I think you bring up agood point about how the eye
(20:08):
itself is important becauseit's such a direct expression,
and directly the way thatwe express ourselves.
And we make contact.
When we're not physicallytouching each other,
we're making contact through that,
looking at each other's eyes.
So I thought that wasan interesting point.
But Dara, you have a questionthat you've been dying to ask,
(20:28):
so I'll be quiet for a minute.
- Oh, I was just curious about,
so you know, you workon your fun eyes a lot.
You also, of course, havethe rest of your business
with the more, like, the realistic eyes.
And I wanted to talk, youjust talk about a bit of,
you know, a bit about whatit's like to paint them.
I have a bit of an art background,
(20:49):
so I'm very interestedin how you make them look
so realistic, but also, you know,
how people interact with those.
You know, are they surprisedat how realistic they look
when they have them in?
Like, I just want to heara bit more about that.
- Yeah, I trained undera few different people,
and the last person I trainedunder, who was Fred Harwin,
(21:13):
I moved to Portland basicallyto reevaluate my skills
and obtain better ones.
And so, to do that, you know,nine years in is really hard.
I essentially dropped everything I knew
as far as technique went,
and relearned how I was painting
and how I was even goingabout my fitting processes.
(21:34):
I retrained myself completely.
And I think I pushed myself to a limit
where I saw where he was, youknow, like his skill level,
and I was like, "I need to be above that.
I need to figure out waysto get better results
or better, you know, ways to,you know, just to show it."
(laughs) But yeah, my processing for that,
it's been amazing.
(21:57):
I played around with technology a little.
I think it really is justdoing the time and putting time
into painting and learninghow to develop color.
I do teach color theorywith the ocularist, too.
We all are working together
to make better products, obviously.
But I think it really helpsto have a good understanding
(22:17):
of color theory, how colors come out.
Because it's not justputting a color down,
it's thinking about theirlighting or if they have a pupil.
I'll do pupils that look like they expand
if they have a lighter eye.
And that technique I learned from Fred,
and it was actually, like, a larger pupil
and doing almost a stippling technique
(22:38):
around the larger pupil thatwas very opaque in color.
So like a white or a light gray over top,
and there's little spotsthat are in between.
So in bright light, itlooks like it's tiny,
like the pupil's really tiny.
And then in dark light-- Oh.
- it looks-- Oh, how interesting.
- Yeah.
- That's fascinating.- The opacity goes away
and it looks bigger.
But it's fun to do.
(23:00):
And once you get it it'sactually really helpful, I think,
in, like, all sorts of situations.
Whether or not you're,like, going to dinner
with your partner,
or going to a movie andyou're in a dim light area.
You know, it's kind of nice to have that.
- Right.- But yeah,
it's just time and effort,
really, is what it boils down to.
- Christina, how did youget interested in this
in the first place?
It's such a unique career path.
(23:21):
- Yeah.
- I'm really-- Yeah.
- I'm really curious asto how you even sort of
stumbled upon it and then what, you know,
what drew you towards it.
- Yeah.
I actually really wantedto get into making limbs
when I was younger, and I gotmy degree in industrial design
at the Art Institute ofPhiladelphia. (laughs)
(23:42):
- Okay.
- And I liked it becauseit was all hands-on.
So industrial design was my background,
and I was working on ahuman factors course,
and at that time I wasmaking a table, chair,
all sorts of stuff, really big things.
And I said, "Oh, I'm gonnamake something small."
So it ended up beinglike kind of a cop out
to do something small.
(Christina and Mark laughing)
(24:03):
- But I was like, I don't know,
people take their eyes out, right?
They pop their eyes out like dentures.
I have no idea.
I've never met anyone with an eyeball.
So here I am working, actually,
I was in an art history course.
I was making a case thathad, like, braille lettering
that said like, "eyeballcase" or something.
It had a suction cup to take your eye out.
It had a mirror, it had, like,a place to put your eyeball.
(24:25):
I don't know.
It had a place for lubrication.
So what little I didfind, I was just like,
"What would be useful to have
for someone in that sort of a need?"
And I happened to beworking on it in a museum...
Well, it was art history.
And the lady next to me had an eye.
I had no clue.
(24:46):
She actually waited till everyone left
and she, like, poppedit out, which I thought-
- That is so nuts.- she just had like lazy eye.
I thought she had a lazy eye.
I honestly, like, didn'tknow that she had an eye.
So generally, yeah, like eyes,
sometimes if they're not fitting right
just look like lazy eyes,
and most people just, like,don't even pay attention.
So it's kind of amazing.
(25:07):
So I just kind of said, she goes,
"I think my ocularist mighthave a spare for your project."
And I go, "Really? Okay."
So I went there and I-
- Did you go, "Really?What's an ocularist?"
- Yeah.
- (laughs) 'Cause that'swhat I would've said.
- Yeah. I was just like, "What?"
- (laughs) Yeah, same.
- I didn't know the name of it back then.
- Is that that VR thingeverybody's playing with?
- (laughs) Yeah, the Oculus, right, right.
(25:28):
(Mark laughing)
Oh my gosh.
- Which is, by the way,
ocularist has gotta be oneof the coolest sounding names
for a profession ever.
- It does sound very fancy.
- It does.- Yeah.
- But it's funnier whenyour phone auto corrects
to occultist and you'relike, "Wait, what?"
(Mark and Dara laughing)
- That's not what I meant.
- Yeah, also anotherinteresting career out there.
(25:48):
- Yeah.
- Ocularist also sounds likethe name of a superhero, right?
Like, "We're in trouble, call Ocularist."
- Yeah.
- It's just got that-- We should do that, yeah.
- ring to it.
Which, in a way, it isthe name of a superhero
if you really think about it, right?
I'm calling you a superhero, Christina.
(Christina laughing)
She's like, "Yeah, that sounds good."
(26:08):
- Well, thanks.
I don't know, I see myselfmore of as a magician.
If your job's done right, no one notices.
- There you go.
- It's like the most cool job,
the most unnoticeable job in the world.
- There you go.
- Yeah, no one notices untillike recently, obviously.
But, yeah.
- Well, see, that's what's interesting,
'cause you basically havetwo sides of your job,
(26:29):
where one side, thegoal is what people want
is an eye that completelymatches their other eye
and is essentially invisible.
And that's the goal and what'sgoing to make them happy
about the eye.
And then you have otherpeople who the entire goal
is to be not invisible,
to be the most obvious possible,
and that's what's goingto make them happy.
- Exactly.
- So it's like you do similar things,
(26:50):
but they have completelydifferent effects-
- Yeah.- each time.
- Yeah. No, they do.
And I mean, that's theother thing I've learned
is with the fun eyes, like,
it kind of pushes me to, like,get my techniques better,
which is why I startedto do that because...
Let's see if I have one.
At the tops of most ofthe eyes I'll, like,
I used to ask people, and Istill do for the regular eyes,
(27:12):
just to mark where thetop is, the insertion,
if they've got somethingthey want me to paint.
So, like, some people will say,
"Oh, I want a rose for the Rose City,"
or, "I want my pet,"
or, "I want, like, my career,"
or, "I want an emblem or something."
So I paint that.
But the fun eyes were just,like, an expansion of that,
which was kind of cool to, you know,
(27:33):
fix and push myself to alimit, basically, artistically,
which I thought was reallyhelpful for my overall career.
So it's just extra practice,if you think of it like that.
Yeah, it's kind of neat.
- Yeah.
- You know, Dara, if youcame to me a week ago
and said like, "Oh, you know,the people who make eyes,
(27:54):
like, does that sound interesting?"
I'd be like, "Not really."
- No.
- Oh my gosh.
Like, what?
Like, you keep saying, Dara,
like, the artistic aspect of it.
- Yeah.
- The reward of it.
Like, to me, it's harder toimagine how you got into it
(28:15):
than it is to imagine why you stay in it.
Like, after talking to you,
it's just such aninteresting and absolutely...
I mean, it sounds very exciting.
It sounds like the humanconnection is fantastic,
and it sounds like, you know,
I think people love toget good at stuff, right?
And you particularly seem like, Christina,
(28:36):
like that's part of what draws you to this
is just how much better can I get?
Like, "That's great-"- Exactly.
"I just did this eye.
how much better can I do the next eye,
and the next eye and thenext eye and the next eye?"
- Yeah.
And that's almost an issue with me.
Yeah, I never like any eyeI make, usually. (laughs)
Like, I'll just go-- Yeah.
- "Oh, that was okay.
Yeah, we can do better."
(28:57):
Like, it's really sad,and everyone else is like,
usually when I give aneye they'll be, you know,
inspecting it and saying,
"Oh, this is cool. Well,did you see this thing?"
Or they'll see a photo.
I usually photo before and after
and I'll show them with my camera,
and they'll go,
"Oh, yeah, the prostheticlooks really good."
And I'll go, "That's your real eye."
(29:18):
And they go, "Oh, we thoughtthat was the prosthetic.
Oh, our good eye needs,like, fixing or something."
- That's gotta be socool when that happens.
- Yeah.- Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
- And I think that peoplewho are perfectionists
and people who getreally good at their job
are probably because of howcritical they are of themselves.
- Yeah.
- So, you know, I don'tthink that that's...
I think that that's just a good quality
(29:39):
is all I would call it.
I wouldn't, you know, it doesn't seem like
it's really a problem.
It's made you hugely successful.
And so, what are the technical questions
or just curiosity, like notknowing this world of people
who need an eye like this.
- Yeah.
- You mentioned somethingearlier about fit, right?
(29:59):
And you said if the fit is right,
which conceptually can make sense.
- Yeah.
- But am I right in assumingthat if you have an eye
that fits really well, ittracks with the other eye?
So when you look left or right,
that the fake eye, replacement eye,
however you say that, is tracking with it?
- No.
- Or does it not do that?- No.
(30:21):
So the tracking is incorrelation to, like,
whether a surgeon, if they've had, like,
a trauma of how they've lost their eye,
if the muscles were reattached,
if they've had the eye removed,'cause we fit over both.
There's some where you fit over
where their eye is still there.
So there's been no muscle reattachment.
Sometimes it's shrunken.
And then recently, I just madeone for a lady named Chelsea,
(30:43):
which is on my social media,
and she has a very full globe.
So hers was challenging in particularly
because it was almostas open as her regular,
you know, regular eye.
- Mm-hmm.
- So adding key material to it,
I think hers measured in atlike a half a millimeter thick
or less in certain points.
Very, very thin.
(31:03):
And we have to paint inbetween those layers, too.
So it's very, very thin.
But if someone has their eye removed,
what I'm gonna hold up is a...
They used to be likelittle coral implants.
And this is just plastic.
And there's little tiny,like, places where a muscle
can grow into.
- Oh, I see.- So they'll have-
- Like, deeply sort of textured.
(31:25):
- Yes, so the muscles go-- It feels like it would be
like a very coarse sandpaperykind of feel almost.
- Yeah.- What it looks like.
- So it's more of a plastic.
It feels kind of dull.
So the surgeons will open upthe muscles that you have,
take out the eye, remove themuscles, and then reattach.
And usually they'll put,like, donor tissue over top.
So the inside of a socket,
(31:46):
it's not graphic,
but it looks like theinside of your cheek.
It should look pink whenit's healed properly.
- Okay.
- And healing after your eye's...
Yeah, healing after your eye's removed
is like six to eight weeks.
Depends.
And then if you get,
sometimes if they don't put a implant in,
they'll put a fat graft,
which is usually taken,like, from your buttocks area
(32:06):
or your, like, abdomen.
And that can take upto six months to heal.
So I can't imaginebeing without, you know,
an eye for that long.
That's a really long time.
But they'll take all that out.
And depending on how things have healed,
I take an impression.
I grabbed some other materials.
I like using this stuff called BPS.
(32:27):
It looks terrifying, right?
- Yeah.
- So now the-- For our viewers at home-
- It looks worse on film.
- know that this straightup looks like a hulk gun.
- Right, like I'm ready to go tranquilize
or something, right?
- Right.
Or a laser gun.
Maybe it's part of your-
- Right.- superhero persona.
Like, that's what you...
(Dara laughing)- There we go.
- It becomes a space laser.
(32:47):
- I won't approachsomeone's face with this,
'cause I wouldn't want tobe approached with this.
So a lot of my fittings-- I would go immediately
into defensive mode.
- Yeah, I don't know if Iwould stay in that chair.
- I would assume-- Yeah.
- you're trying to vaporize me.
(Dara laughing)
- It's so bad.
I have a little mixing tipthat'll mix the two parts.
- That I'm not near as afraid of.
- Yeah.(Dara laughing)
- If you think of epoxy,
(33:07):
like, that's like a two-part type thing.
This stuff will go on.
There's two differentmaterials that most people use.
It's alginite, which isa derivative of, like,
seaweed or kelp.
So it sets liquidy.
Or, it'll go in liquidand then set like jello.
So it's kind of a coolmaterial to squish around.
And then there's this, whichwill set a little harder.
(33:28):
But it's better over kindof like a damaged eye,
so it doesn't irritate the socket as much.
And so I'll place some ofthat in a bowl, a mixing bowl,
and then I'll put it on a impression tray,
which I've got like, I don't know,
a whole bunch of impressiontrays that are different shapes
that I insert into the socket,
and it's got, like, a little stem,
(33:49):
and that's where I'llplace the material through
so it kind of fills that area.
And that's where you'll get the movement.
So as long as it fills the area entirely,
you'll be able to capturewhat movement there is.
So, yeah.
- You're saying it kinda-- That's it.
- It kind of has to be near all...
It has to be touching the skin
that has the muscles underneath, or else-
- Yeah.
(34:09):
- there won't be any movement, basically.
- Yep.
Yeah, so, I mean, if you wereto think over your own lid
when you, like, kindof peek under your lid,
that tissue stops and comes back up.
So I'm just filling likea contact, a really big-
- Okay.- area that's contact shape.
Put in maybe like acouple millimeters thick.
That's all it is, yeah.
- I was gonna say that thiskind of Hollywood trope
(34:30):
of the glass eye that's really a marble,
it doesn't sound like that'svery accurate at all that-
- Like this guy right here? (laughs)
- Yeah.
- I mean, I understandwhere they got that.
So this is like a piece ofglass, it's a doll's eye,
and there would be naturally a long stem
where the glass blower wouldbe blowing from the back.
(34:51):
I actually got to watchanother ocularist in Germany.
During the pandemic we gotto do virtual conferences,
which was really cool inthe ocularistry field.
And so they would create the iris,
and then they would create the back of it,
and they would literally,like, take these calibers,
not these, but their own,
and they would, while it was hot,
(35:12):
kind of, like, squishit in certain directions
and capture that person's eye.
And if it didn't match up perfectly,
they would just cast itaside and make another one
because you can't go back in with glass.
And I believe that's wherethe term stock eye came from.
So stock eyes are also a thing
(35:32):
where I've seen some people still,
they're made, like, Ithink India and Mexico
and a few other places still make them,
but it's something I usuallypush to stay away from
because if a stock eyedoesn't fit correctly,
that implant that you have in your socket
can rub through the tissueand you can have an exposure.
(35:53):
- Oh.
- Which is it coming through the surface.
And that's why I, like, emphasizeon the fit being well fit.
Not so much with the movement.
I mean, I hope that, you know,they've got great movement,
and for the most part, I usually have,
most people do show up,so I usually am able
to check everything,
or I'll work with theirocularist when they get a fun eye
(36:16):
and make sure that they're seen
to make sure everything fits properly.
'Cause yeah, we don't want exposures
and we don't want to risk that.
And I think that's important, too,
because it's funny, I wasthinking about that the other day.
Someone said, "Well, couldn'tyou just ship something out?
Couldn't you just makesomething?" You know?
And I go, "No, I can't do a prefabbed one
(36:38):
because if it rubs, that couldlead to so many problems."
And also being board certified, you know,
you gotta watch all that because-
- Right.- Yeah.
- there's making eyes andthere's doing a good job.
You don't want to do adisservice to the community,
and yeah, that's it.
- So is what I'm hearing that in the US
(36:58):
there was a time whenthey were more, like,
circular and marble like,
and then they became thisidea of doing them more
like flat concave, or have,
in the US have they always been more
of the concave-like ones like you make?
- Yeah, I think they'vealways been concave.
I think that's just Hollywoodmaking them circular.
(37:20):
I don't know why.- Okay.
- It's just, you know,and some people come in
and their loved ones come in and go,
"Well, we thought you werejust gonna give them a ball."
- Yeah.- "What happened?" You know?
(Dara laughing)
- Yeah, I mean, I still hearpeople get that impression-
- Yeah.- 'cause I could think like
even a couple years ago in like"Avengers: Endgame" you see-
(37:42):
- Right.
- Or maybe that was-- Oh my gosh.
- No, that's "Infinity War."
It's an orb.
- Was it the...
An orb, but also, if you've noticed
during the "Infinity War,"I forget which one exactly,
one of the Avengers, the father.
Oh no, it was, what is the...
(38:03):
"Black Panther."
The father in that is actuallywearing a prosthetic eye.
- Oh, he is?
- I remember watching that in the theater-
Oh, yeah.
When it goes to, like, thescene where he's, like,
kinda like passed along and dead,
that's been interesting because, like,
I looked at my partner and I go,
(38:24):
"Do you see he's wearing a prosthetic eye?
They could not have just paid someone
to make him a better eye?
Are you kidding me? Withall these visual effects?"
I'm like-- Funny.
- "Get the poor man a better eye."
But anytime there's eyes in a movie,
oh, I get hit up all the time.
All the time.
But yeah, my coworker sent me a note.
She says the role for theeyeballs was for dramatic effect.
(38:46):
I was like, "This is verytrue. This is very true."
(Dara laughing)
And then-- Well, and-
- Yeah. Oh, go ahead.
- Oh, I was just gonna say
I'm very glad to have thattrope cleared up, by the way.
Like, literally as a layperson,
this concept of sort of an initial implant
that you're puttingsomething over the top of
and that it's not just a round, you know,
(39:08):
oblong marble or somethingthat you're sticking in there-
- You'll just pop a marble in.
- Like, I would have made a fool of myself
before this conversation.- Yeah.
- In what I know.- Yeah, yeah.
- So I think that's a...
I appreciate having that all cleared up.
That's great.- Yeah, exactly.
- And you know what, Hollywood'sHollywood, so let them.
(Dara laughing)
They need that eye to roll away and to-
- Yes.
(39:28):
- try to chase it for it to be funny.
- Exactly, exactly.- Your eyes are fun,
but they're not funny,'cause they don't roll away.
So, you know, we'llleave that to Hollywood.
- Yeah.(Mark laughing)
Well, or Rachel, 'cause she'll throw them.
I'm like, "Just wait."- Oh.
Beaming somebody with youreyeball just sounds like fun
no matter what shape it is.
(Dara laughing)That's fine.
- Yeah, absolutely.
(39:49):
Little kids love doing that.
The little kids usually will-- Wait, really?
- And, like, chuck them.
Or the best is they'll takethem out, they'll chuck them,
or they'll bite them, or something weird.
- Oh.- Oh my gosh.
Little kids are funny.
But, yeah, yeah.
- Well, listen, this conversationhas been incredibly fun.
And like I said, I wouldnever have predicted
that a conversation with what I now know
(40:10):
is called an ocularist,did I say that right?
- Yes.
Yes, you did.
- What's that? Swedish?
Would be so much fun.
So thank you for such a fun conversation.
Thank you for enlightening us.
This is what we love about thispodcast is we learn so much.
And we've learned a coupleof our preconceptions here
are completely wrong,
(40:31):
from the shape of aneye that you would make
to just how exciting andfun and artistic your career
is and can be.
And I think it's just amazing,
amazing how you've stretchedthe boundaries of what you do
(40:52):
in a way that's just touched other people
in the way it has.
And you know, so kudos to you for that.
Anything that you didn'tbring up or that we didn't say
or that you feel likeyou should reemphasize
before we part ways?
- No, I think we covered,like, a lot of bases.
I think that was reallyinformative, actually.
(41:13):
I think, yeah.
- Well, maybe, did youlearn anything, Christina?
(Dara laughing)
Or was it just...
I think Dara and I did allthe learning for everyone
if I had guess. (laughs)
- Yeah.- Yeah.
Well no, it's sometimes niceto hear, like, the other side,
'cause that's somethingI'm also exploring is,
like, what other people perceive us as,
(41:33):
or what they perceive prosthetics as,
or what they look like,or how they're made.
It's nice to hear that side.
No matter how manyyears I've been in this,
it's just refreshing to hear, you know,
like the typical questions 'cause-
- Yeah.
- it helps me know what to answer
or what could be a questionto someone who's embarrassed
about asking that question.
(41:53):
So, yeah.
- Yeah.
- You want to know what peopleare thinking in their head,
and just, like, waitingand just not saying-
- Yeah.- kind of deal.
- I mean, we all have knowledge bias-
- Absolutely.
- based on whatever it isthat we know really well.
And I think sometimes it's nice to revisit
that perspective of somebodywho's just not exposed
to everything that you-
- Yeah.- deal with every day.
(42:15):
- The beginner.
- Yeah, the beginner.
- Yeah, yeah.
Exactly.
- Well, thank you so much.
- Awesome.
- A really fun conversation.- Yeah.
- Really appreciate youand all that you've done.
- It was great having you on today.
- It absolutely was.
- Cool.
- Well, this is Mark Miller-- Thanks. (laughs)
- thanking Christina and Dara
and reminding you allto keep it accessible.
(42:41):
(uplifting music)
This podcast has beenbrought to you by TPGi,
the experts in digital accessibility.
Stay tuned for more "RealPeople, Real Stories" podcasts
coming soon.
(uplifting music)
(uplifting music)
- Welcome to TPGi's
"Real People, Real Stories" podcast,
where you'll find interestingand diverse stories
from folks working to make theworld a more inclusive place.
Hey, welcome to "Real People,Real Stories" podcast,
brought to you by TPGi.
I'm your host, Mark Miller,
(00:21):
thanking you for helpingus keep it accessible.
Do us a favor, if you're enjoying
the "Real People, Real Stories" podcast,
share it, tell someone about it,
even link to it fromyour accessible website.
So welcome, everybody.
Thank you for joining us.
We've got a really funshow, I think, ahead here.
I want to first introduceDara, my co-host.
(00:42):
And she found a really, really fun person
for us to talk to today.
So I'd like to welcomeChristina King to the podcast.
Hi, Christina, how are you?
- I'm great. (laughs)
- You're great.
Perfect.- I'm great.
- So (laughs) that's good.
It's good to establishthat we're all great.
The first thing I wanted...
(01:03):
Can you just, you kind of have this,
I'm just gonna call itlike a really fun idea
for fundraising that you came up with,
and I think that that's what Dara,
is the reason she reached out to you
because it was just so quirkyand cool and fun and all that.
Can you tell us a little bit
about why you're trying to raise funds,
(01:23):
and then the way that you do it,
this really fun way that you do it?
- Yeah, absolutely.
So I had met Rachel Mackenzlee,
I think it was probably alittle over two years ago.
- Mm-hmm.
- And she'd come to mefrom another ocularist,
and usually when you're with an ocularist
you're kind of like married to them,
'cause you develop likethis amazing bond with them.
(01:44):
You share their story, their life.
And so, she was really nervewrecked to leave her ocularist.
And especially for someonewho's, like, younger
and maybe not as, like,knowledgeable, she wasn't sure.
And so, she came to me and we made an eye.
She was amazing,
'cause I had someone running late that day
and they actually,
she waited like three hours
'cause the person was three hours late.
- Mm-hmm.- Go figure.
(02:06):
So she hung around, and afterwe met and I made her an eye,
she said she was, like, from"One-Eyed and Wonderful."
And I said, "Oh my gosh,didn't you have blonde hair?"
And we're just kinda likediscussing all this stuff,
and we had all these common interests.
I'm into plants and, like,tattoos, and all sorts of stuff.
And she kind of had the same interests.
So we kept talking and she said,
(02:26):
"You know, I'd reallylike, like, a fun eye."
(Mark laughing)
But she's like, "I'm nervous."
She wanted like a gold iris.
So I literally got, like,24 caret gold flakes
and I laid it out,
and I made her her first gold eye.
I just made it 'cause I didn't know
if I should be charging or what.
I just was like,
"This could be really cool tojust see in someone's socket."
(02:47):
And I'm, like, here for that.
And she got it, and she kind of was like,
"I wish I went, like, full gold."
Or, "I wish I, like,did something bigger."
So we started developingall these different eyes
and designs and, like,really getting into it.
And eventually, it's obviouslycaught on with social media,
people are seeing her post,
which leads them back to me,
(03:09):
and which led to thislittle girl, Gracie, last,
I want to say last summer.
And she wanted an eye.
And at that time I think I wascharging like, I don't know,
like 300 or something.
Way under rate.
'Cause most eyes, welllet's talk about price.
They're usually like, I don't know,
four grand to I'veheard as much as 10,000.
(03:29):
I think ours, through insurance,
are like between 5 and 6,000.
The insurance does not always pay that,
but that's what we charge.
And, of course, I always have cash prices
for people who just can't afford it.
I am like a bleedingheart, so I can't help it.
But she decided to dothis fundraiser for like,
(03:50):
she was like, "I don't know,maybe we could help raise money
for this little girl named Gracie."
And we did.
And within the first hour she was like,
I told her 300, and she was like,
"Let's ask for 500."
And I was like, she's like,
'cause they take minimumof like 10 hours to make.
So they're labor intensive.
- Right.
- Whether they're fun or regular.
Yeah, go ahead.
(04:12):
So we raised the money withinan hour and we were like,
"Why aren't we helping more people?"
So we kind of just were like,"Let's keep this going."
- Wow.
- And before I knew it,
it was kind of wild 'cause there was,
there's actually like a podcast called...
What is it?
"Not Your Mom's House"or something like that.
Or "Your Mom's House."
(04:32):
And the lady, Christina, was amazing.
She donated like $5,000. Like-
- Oh, no way.- Completely nice.
Like, and we're actuallysigned up to go see her.
She's gonna be in townat the end of March.
So we're really excited,
because for every 500 we'vedecided to make a fun eye.
There's a little criteria for that.
And so far, I actually just added it up,
(04:53):
we've made like 30 eyes so far.
- Of the fun eyes?- So it's been helping people.
- Of, like, the extra-- Yeah, yeah.
- Wow.
- Yeah. And we actuallyhave, which is amazing,
we actually have, of all of those,
we have like, I thinkthere's still like 150 people
signed up for a fun eyethat can't afford one.
So I think it's just kindof cool to see, like,
all of the interests around the world.
(05:15):
And, like, working with all these people,
it's really cool to seethem happy and excited,
and it's like a sense of closure
and, like, healing that you won't,
you know, I guess I didn't see happening.
And when I started to see that,
I think Rachel and I kinda, like,
looked at each other and we're like,
"Do you see the lightbeaming from their faces?
We're gonna do this."
- Wow.- Like, it's game on.
(05:36):
- And it seems like it kind of ended up
sort of doubling up on itself in a way
in the sense that, you know,you created this scenario
where people wanted todonate all this money,
but then with your kindof fun eye, I don't know,
incentive, right, you're also-
- Yeah.
- you're kind of donating,
or like making an agreement with everybody
(05:58):
that I'm gonna give back, too,
as much as you give backwith these fun eyes.
And then now you have like double,
I guess double the eyesor something just about-
- Yeah.- that are coming out.
- Yeah.
- Do people, like how many people...
Are they excited about these fun eyes?
They're wearing these fun eyes?
(06:19):
Do they wear them all the time?
Do they wear them when they go out?
Like, how does that work?- Yeah.
So the most depressing iswhen, like, I make them,
if they're in office,
they happen to come in for a normal eye.
I've gotten a lot morebookings where it's like,
"We want to come in for our normal eye,"
which is paid through insurance,
but then, "We also wantto get a separate fun eye.
Could we sign up at the same time?"
(06:39):
And so we're booking, like, doubles kinda.
And there's also people thatwill, like, write me and say,
"We want a fun eye."
They'll schedule to come out or, you know,
or give me their eye to copy,'cause that's all I need.
And they, like, they don'teven know what they want.
So it's just the idea ofChristina's making this.
(07:00):
- (indistinct)
- I don't care what she makes,I'm gonna rock her design.
- Yeah.
- And I've also gotten, like,
some creative freedom on a few of them,
so I'm really excited for that.
So they're like, "Well, thisis kind of what we're into,
and this is what we like."
So it's like a tattooartist, but for your eyeball.
- Yeah, I was gonna say thatit's like you're an artist-
- Yeah.
- and people want your creation
(07:21):
as much as they just want something new,
which has gotta feel fantastic, right?
- Yeah. Oh, it definitely does.
But, well, the sad partis when they, like,
get their normal eye andthen they end up going,
"We're not wearing it."
Like, "Sorry you spent15 hours making this.
We like the fun eyes."
And they, like, toss it aside.
- The fun eye's more fun.
That's why you wear the fun eye.
(Dara and Mark laughing)- Yeah, yeah.
(07:41):
Well, and they get to choose
when people know thatthey have a fake eye.
So I was just like, "This is kinda great."
Yeah.
- Well, and I wanted to ask,
so I've seen a bit ofthe clips on your TikTok
of you making them a bit.
So could you walk us throughthe process of making say,
let's talk about, like, thesparkly one you made for
Rachel Mackenzlee with allof the little crystals in it.
(08:04):
Can you talk through the processof how that eye gets made?
What goes into that 10 hours?- Yeah.
So the process startswith molding the eye,
which I grabbed a few things.
I thought this would come up.
I will have, usually, a wax shape
depending on whatever shape their eye is,
or their existing eye thatI can copy if it fits well.
(08:25):
And then that actuallygoes into a two part mold.
And I pack that with whiteplastic and I grind it all down.
And I actually do multiple layers.
That's why I think it, like,gets very blingy looking.
In fact, when I gave her herreally Swarovski crystal one,
I said, "Careful."
'Cause it was, like,the sun was going down.
(08:46):
I was like, "Do not stareat that rear view mirror
while you're driving home,because you will crash."
'Cause even in our room it was,like, reflecting everywhere.
- Wow.
- So it was really fun to watch.
And she goes, "No way."
So what I do is I'll grindit down to the white layer.
Recently I've been using,
actually it's like a nail flake,
and it's like an iridescent color.
(09:07):
So I'll go all the way to the edges,
'cause I think it's important to, like,
fill the entire space.
And I have one here that I'm working on,
and it actually, yeah,they're really sparkly.
So I'll layer it,
and I'll do a second coatwhere I'll cut it down
kinda like halfway afterI do the first layer.
And then I'll add morecrystals on top of that
(09:29):
so they kind of, like,reflect off of each other.
So it turns out really pretty.
- And I just want todescribe that a little bit,
'cause some of our audience
may be without vision completely.
So what Christina just showed
is almost like a round cut crystal
with a lot of differentangles in the crystal to it.
And I can completelyunderstand what you mean
(09:51):
about light refracting allover the place because-
- Yeah.- I think at some point
when I was in fifth grade,
we sold the little crystalsthat hang off a string
and spin around that people would put
in their rear view mirrors and stuff,
and they would create these prisms-
- Oh, yeah.- and colors and stuff
that would shine lightthrough all over the place.
(10:12):
So that's very fun and cool.
- Mm-hmm.
Yeah.- So didn't mean to interrupt.
- They're a blast to make.- Please keep going,
but I wanted to make sure that,
I know we have a lot ofpeople without vision.
- No, you're good.
- So if you're showing cool stuff,
I want to make sure thatthey know what it looks like.
So is there anything more to the process,
or does that pretty much cover it?
- Oh, so yeah, so I coatit a couple of times.
(10:34):
I do individualized cooks.
- So the first time that I process it,
each time I, you know, I say cook,
but it's processing for two hours,
I usually grind them down.
The mold making itselfis maybe half hour or so
once I get everythingset, the plastic set.
Then it's a two hour process to cook,
another half hour to grind down
and prep for another painting.
(10:55):
So if it requires doublethe painting or layers,
I do it again.
So that adds, you know,four, eight, you know,
like it just adds up.
- It's going, yeah.
- Yeah. If I'm physically painting,
which I'm in front ofmy painting table now,
it could be an hour to two hours.
I've spent three to four hours painting.
And then it processes again.
(11:17):
And then when I...
So that's another twohours and I grind it down.
And then there's, like, thefinal little adjustments,
which could take up to an hour.
So it adds up.
It definitely does.
And the fun eyes are doneon top of normal work.
So, yeah.
- (laughs) So it's almost like this cycle
of how they get made, basically,
where you're going throughsimilar steps over and over
until there's a finished product.
(11:40):
- Yep.- It's like making a-
- Exactly, exactly.- a katana, right?
Like, just keep folding themetal until you're done, right?
- Yep.
- Tons and tons and tons of time.
- Eventually it'll come to.
- Yeah.- Yeah, exactly.
- So this is what I'm reallywondering about, right,
because I've got this image in my head
of these people nowwalking around with one eye
(12:01):
that is just, like, nuts, right?
Like something thatyou've never seen before.
Do your, I don't know,what do you call them?
Patience? Clients?
- Clients.- Clients.
- I don't like patients.- Yeah.
- 'Cause they've dealtwith the doctors already.
- So do your clients ever-
What's that?
- Yeah.
I said they've dealt with doctors already.
I'm like, "No, they're clients."
(12:22):
- Clients, right.
- 'Cause we end up being friends usually.
- Friends. (laughs)
- Yeah, that's it.
It's fine.
- So do your patient/client/friends,
do they come back and,like, tell you stories of,
you know, what it's likewhen they walk around,
you know, they go to themall or they, you know,
filling up their gas tank,
(12:43):
they're going out todinner with the fun eye.
(Christina laughing)
Like, what kind of reactions,and what do people say and do?
- Yeah.
Well, between the actualreactions from the clients
themselves and then online,
the online community's crazy.
Like, Rachel will come back and be like,
"I just went to Target."
(13:04):
And she goes, "Thislady stops me and goes,
'You're the girl.
Like, oh my God,
you're wearing yourSwarovski crystal eye.'"
Or, "You're wearing your new-"
- Oh my gosh, she was recognized.
- "(indistinct) eye."
They know her.
Or they'll go through our coffee shop,
oh my gosh, one of the local coffee shops,
and they go like, "Quick, come here."
And they'll, like, pulleveryone aside and be like,
"Look, it's Rachel, it's Rachel."
(13:25):
Like, they know.
Or, like, the little kids that I feature,
they're definitely,like, spotted, you know?
So it's kind of interesting or, I mean,
and then there's also likethe social media aspect where,
like, it'll take on a life of its own.
Like, I just featured, like, a gold eye
that had a diamond in it,like right in the center,
and, like, one of thebiggest comments were like,
(13:46):
"Illuminati."
And you're like, "What?"
- Oh, that's funny.(Dara laughing)
- Well, and it goes to Illuminati
because at the top of theeye, what you don't see,
is it's a triangle and eyeball,
but then there's a circle and, like,
it was just like, youdon't see the most of it,
you just see the triangle and the eye.
And he didn't ask for it.
I just was like, "I don't know,let me put a symbol up top
(14:07):
so he knows where the top is."
But it took on a whole new life.
- That's great.
- Yeah, and they're like,
"That man is gonna get hiseyeball stolen from him."
And I'm like, "It's like a $40diamond. It's nothing big."
- Right.(Dara laughing)
And hopefully if it's stolen,
it's, like, out of hishouse while he's at work
and not directly out of his eye.
(14:29):
- Unfortunately, they would be like,
"Oh, he's gonna getrobbed for his eyeball."
- Oh, I hope not.
That would be awful.
(Christina laughing)
- Yeah, social mediacomments are an experience.
- Oh, they are, they are. (laughs)
- And I feel like you shouldalmost collect the stories.
Like, you've gotta have somany stories that come up,
(14:50):
and there's gotta bestories you don't even hear.
Part of your social mediashould just be, like,
how the public reacts tothese eyes because it's-
- Well, yeah, I'mactually working on that.
I have something,
I have a conference coming up
with a whole bunch of one-eyed members,
but the bigger thing that I'm featuring is
(15:10):
I'm getting two 16 incheyeballs in diameter
that are like thesehyper realistic eyeballs.
So I'm actually gonna dokind of a spoof of, like,
"Between Two Ferns,"
but it's gonna be called"Right Between the Eyes."
- Oh, that's good.
- So two eyeballs.
And I get to do a Q&A with,you know, the clients-
- That's a great idea.
- or I'm gonna bring doctors in and, like,
(15:32):
we can address, like, either the stories,
how they lost their eye,like all sorts of stuff,
which I think is gonna be really cool
to, like, have a place to check out.
And also for people alsogoing through, like, eye loss,
like a place to, you know, check back,
like how eyes are made orhow things are done or, like,
just to know a little bit of the process
before they get into it.
(15:52):
- So, yeah.- Yeah.
- What really strikes me aboutjust your whole story here,
Christina, is thatyou've taken something...
Like, nobody wants to lose an eye.
That's a negative thingthat if you ask anybody,
they'd be like,
"Yeah, I'd rather keepit, thank you." You know?
(16:12):
And you've turned it aroundinto something, not just fun,
but something that is, like, unique.
Almost, I don't know if theword advantage is right,
but just something that-- (laughs) Yeah.
- is unique and expressive that a person
who only has one eye can now do.
(16:33):
And that can be like a just...
They can be individual insteadof looking at that as like,
"Oh, you know, I lost an eye,and I'm just gonna replace it
and try to look."
- They're in their own little class.
- They're own their ownlittle class, and it's-
- Yeah, they're own cool club.
Yeah, that's it.- Yeah. It's cool club.
(Christina laughing)
It's beyond, "Can yougive me a replacement
so that I look normal?
Like, so I fit into thesocietal kind of norm
(16:56):
of having two eyes." Right?
To, "I'm gonna take itone step above that,
and I'm actually goingto look cool." Right?
"I'm gonna do something that's-"
- Yes, yes.
- So I think it's just...
And I know that that's notwhat you set out to do,
but based on your-
- Yeah.- fun personality
and the heart that you had that created
(17:18):
and that followed this path, you know,
starting with that one, you know,
kid that you were talking about.
That's what came out of it, right?
Which is an interestingthing in and of itself
that it doesn't have to be anidea you bring to fruition.
It can be you justfollowing your personality
and who you are and yourinstincts and what seems right.
(17:39):
- Right.
- And it blows up into this amazing thing.
I just love it.
I just love the way...
It's kind of the ultimatenegative into a positive story.
And in the funnest way, right?
- Exactly.
- Not just like, "Oh, this is a positive."
But it's just fun.
It's nothing but pure funand glitz and glamour.
And you've got these...
(18:00):
People are turning into celebrities,
you're turning into a celebrity.
- Yeah. (laughs)
- In the funnest sense of all that.
And I just think it's wonderful.
- Yeah.
Yeah, one thing I-- Well, and actually-
- Oh, go ahead, sorry.
I cut you off.
- Oh, you go first andthen I'll ask something.
- I was gonna say the coolest part,
not only are they, like, doing these eyes,
not only are they fun,
it's, like, super therapeutic.
So another thing I like to do is
(18:23):
I go with my friend,Sarah, who's a therapist,
and I like to, like, go tosome of the therapy classes
where they teach and just see, like,
what makes someone feelgood about themselves.
So in a way, I kind of bringthat into my own situation.
Because most people that lose their eye,
whether they realize it or not,
they've been through trauma.
Because the removal itself,
especially between COVID and, like,
(18:44):
everyone having their,you know, faces covered,
you're looking at your eyes,
and ultimately that's-- I didn't even think of that.
- Yeah, you make, like,eye contact with people.
So it's really hard forsomeone who either, like,
has had an eye, or an eye thathasn't fit well or look good,
'cause they're with,whatever eye they get,
they have it for like five years
before they're approved for another one.
(19:05):
It's just nice for them tofeel good about it, too.
Eyes are so important.
You know, it's thefirst thing you wake up,
you look in the mirror.
The first thing people lookat when they look at you.
So if you feel good about itand you could put that out,
it's really nice to see that as, like,
a confidence booster, too.
So it's been really cool tosee that, like, come through.
And also, when I happen to get people
(19:26):
like Rachel Mackenzlee and,like, Miss Sunshine together,
we did that in October.
I saw this really cool, like,
bonding that they had between each other.
They lost their eyes different ways,
but they both happened tobe the left eye, anyway,
so they, like, bonded.
And that's kind of why I'mthrowing this little, like,
eyeball party. (laughs)
(19:47):
Because it's really helpful.
Yeah, I think there's, like, a way it...
They really are a one-eyed gang.
- So, yeah.- I think one of the
important things that yousaid there, too, is like,
we always think of sightbeing so important,
which it is, right?
Like, again-- Yeah.
- nobody would choose to lose their sight.
- Exactly.
- But I think you bring up agood point about how the eye
(20:08):
itself is important becauseit's such a direct expression,
and directly the way thatwe express ourselves.
And we make contact.
When we're not physicallytouching each other,
we're making contact through that,
looking at each other's eyes.
So I thought that wasan interesting point.
But Dara, you have a questionthat you've been dying to ask,
(20:28):
so I'll be quiet for a minute.
- Oh, I was just curious about,
so you know, you workon your fun eyes a lot.
You also, of course, havethe rest of your business
with the more, like, the realistic eyes.
And I wanted to talk, youjust talk about a bit of,
you know, a bit about whatit's like to paint them.
I have a bit of an art background,
(20:49):
so I'm very interestedin how you make them look
so realistic, but also, you know,
how people interact with those.
You know, are they surprisedat how realistic they look
when they have them in?
Like, I just want to heara bit more about that.
- Yeah, I trained undera few different people,
and the last person I trainedunder, who was Fred Harwin,
(21:13):
I moved to Portland basicallyto reevaluate my skills
and obtain better ones.
And so, to do that, you know,nine years in is really hard.
I essentially dropped everything I knew
as far as technique went,
and relearned how I was painting
and how I was even goingabout my fitting processes.
(21:34):
I retrained myself completely.
And I think I pushed myself to a limit
where I saw where he was, youknow, like his skill level,
and I was like, "I need to be above that.
I need to figure out waysto get better results
or better, you know, ways to,you know, just to show it."
(laughs) But yeah, my processing for that,
it's been amazing.
(21:57):
I played around with technology a little.
I think it really is justdoing the time and putting time
into painting and learninghow to develop color.
I do teach color theorywith the ocularist, too.
We all are working together
to make better products, obviously.
But I think it really helpsto have a good understanding
(22:17):
of color theory, how colors come out.
Because it's not justputting a color down,
it's thinking about theirlighting or if they have a pupil.
I'll do pupils that look like they expand
if they have a lighter eye.
And that technique I learned from Fred,
and it was actually, like, a larger pupil
and doing almost a stippling technique
(22:38):
around the larger pupil thatwas very opaque in color.
So like a white or a light gray over top,
and there's little spotsthat are in between.
So in bright light, itlooks like it's tiny,
like the pupil's really tiny.
And then in dark light-- Oh.
- it looks-- Oh, how interesting.
- Yeah.
- That's fascinating.- The opacity goes away
and it looks bigger.
But it's fun to do.
(23:00):
And once you get it it'sactually really helpful, I think,
in, like, all sorts of situations.
Whether or not you're,like, going to dinner
with your partner,
or going to a movie andyou're in a dim light area.
You know, it's kind of nice to have that.
- Right.- But yeah,
it's just time and effort,
really, is what it boils down to.
- Christina, how did youget interested in this
in the first place?
It's such a unique career path.
(23:21):
- Yeah.
- I'm really-- Yeah.
- I'm really curious asto how you even sort of
stumbled upon it and then what, you know,
what drew you towards it.
- Yeah.
I actually really wantedto get into making limbs
when I was younger, and I gotmy degree in industrial design
at the Art Institute ofPhiladelphia. (laughs)
(23:42):
- Okay.
- And I liked it becauseit was all hands-on.
So industrial design was my background,
and I was working on ahuman factors course,
and at that time I wasmaking a table, chair,
all sorts of stuff, really big things.
And I said, "Oh, I'm gonnamake something small."
So it ended up beinglike kind of a cop out
to do something small.
(Christina and Mark laughing)
(24:03):
- But I was like, I don't know,
people take their eyes out, right?
They pop their eyes out like dentures.
I have no idea.
I've never met anyone with an eyeball.
So here I am working, actually,
I was in an art history course.
I was making a case thathad, like, braille lettering
that said like, "eyeballcase" or something.
It had a suction cup to take your eye out.
It had a mirror, it had, like,a place to put your eyeball.
(24:25):
I don't know.
It had a place for lubrication.
So what little I didfind, I was just like,
"What would be useful to have
for someone in that sort of a need?"
And I happened to beworking on it in a museum...
Well, it was art history.
And the lady next to me had an eye.
I had no clue.
(24:46):
She actually waited till everyone left
and she, like, poppedit out, which I thought-
- That is so nuts.- she just had like lazy eye.
I thought she had a lazy eye.
I honestly, like, didn'tknow that she had an eye.
So generally, yeah, like eyes,
sometimes if they're not fitting right
just look like lazy eyes,
and most people just, like,don't even pay attention.
So it's kind of amazing.
(25:07):
So I just kind of said, she goes,
"I think my ocularist mighthave a spare for your project."
And I go, "Really? Okay."
So I went there and I-
- Did you go, "Really?What's an ocularist?"
- Yeah.
- (laughs) 'Cause that'swhat I would've said.
- Yeah. I was just like, "What?"
- (laughs) Yeah, same.
- I didn't know the name of it back then.
- Is that that VR thingeverybody's playing with?
- (laughs) Yeah, the Oculus, right, right.
(25:28):
(Mark laughing)
Oh my gosh.
- Which is, by the way,
ocularist has gotta be oneof the coolest sounding names
for a profession ever.
- It does sound very fancy.
- It does.- Yeah.
- But it's funnier whenyour phone auto corrects
to occultist and you'relike, "Wait, what?"
(Mark and Dara laughing)
- That's not what I meant.
- Yeah, also anotherinteresting career out there.
(25:48):
- Yeah.
- Ocularist also sounds likethe name of a superhero, right?
Like, "We're in trouble, call Ocularist."
- Yeah.
- It's just got that-- We should do that, yeah.
- ring to it.
Which, in a way, it isthe name of a superhero
if you really think about it, right?
I'm calling you a superhero, Christina.
(Christina laughing)
She's like, "Yeah, that sounds good."
(26:08):
- Well, thanks.
I don't know, I see myselfmore of as a magician.
If your job's done right, no one notices.
- There you go.
- It's like the most cool job,
the most unnoticeable job in the world.
- There you go.
- Yeah, no one notices untillike recently, obviously.
But, yeah.
- Well, see, that's what's interesting,
'cause you basically havetwo sides of your job,
(26:29):
where one side, thegoal is what people want
is an eye that completelymatches their other eye
and is essentially invisible.
And that's the goal and what'sgoing to make them happy
about the eye.
And then you have otherpeople who the entire goal
is to be not invisible,
to be the most obvious possible,
and that's what's goingto make them happy.
- Exactly.
- So it's like you do similar things,
(26:50):
but they have completelydifferent effects-
- Yeah.- each time.
- Yeah. No, they do.
And I mean, that's theother thing I've learned
is with the fun eyes, like,
it kind of pushes me to, like,get my techniques better,
which is why I startedto do that because...
Let's see if I have one.
At the tops of most ofthe eyes I'll, like,
I used to ask people, and Istill do for the regular eyes,
(27:12):
just to mark where thetop is, the insertion,
if they've got somethingthey want me to paint.
So, like, some people will say,
"Oh, I want a rose for the Rose City,"
or, "I want my pet,"
or, "I want, like, my career,"
or, "I want an emblem or something."
So I paint that.
But the fun eyes were just,like, an expansion of that,
which was kind of cool to, you know,
(27:33):
fix and push myself to alimit, basically, artistically,
which I thought was reallyhelpful for my overall career.
So it's just extra practice,if you think of it like that.
Yeah, it's kind of neat.
- Yeah.
- You know, Dara, if youcame to me a week ago
and said like, "Oh, you know,the people who make eyes,
(27:54):
like, does that sound interesting?"
I'd be like, "Not really."
- No.
- Oh my gosh.
Like, what?
Like, you keep saying, Dara,
like, the artistic aspect of it.
- Yeah.
- The reward of it.
Like, to me, it's harder toimagine how you got into it
(28:15):
than it is to imagine why you stay in it.
Like, after talking to you,
it's just such aninteresting and absolutely...
I mean, it sounds very exciting.
It sounds like the humanconnection is fantastic,
and it sounds like, you know,
I think people love toget good at stuff, right?
And you particularly seem like, Christina,
(28:36):
like that's part of what draws you to this
is just how much better can I get?
Like, "That's great-"- Exactly.
"I just did this eye.
how much better can I do the next eye,
and the next eye and thenext eye and the next eye?"
- Yeah.
And that's almost an issue with me.
Yeah, I never like any eyeI make, usually. (laughs)
Like, I'll just go-- Yeah.
- "Oh, that was okay.
Yeah, we can do better."
(28:57):
Like, it's really sad,and everyone else is like,
usually when I give aneye they'll be, you know,
inspecting it and saying,
"Oh, this is cool. Well,did you see this thing?"
Or they'll see a photo.
I usually photo before and after
and I'll show them with my camera,
and they'll go,
"Oh, yeah, the prostheticlooks really good."
And I'll go, "That's your real eye."
(29:18):
And they go, "Oh, we thoughtthat was the prosthetic.
Oh, our good eye needs,like, fixing or something."
- That's gotta be socool when that happens.
- Yeah.- Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
- And I think that peoplewho are perfectionists
and people who getreally good at their job
are probably because of howcritical they are of themselves.
- Yeah.
- So, you know, I don'tthink that that's...
I think that that's just a good quality
(29:39):
is all I would call it.
I wouldn't, you know, it doesn't seem like
it's really a problem.
It's made you hugely successful.
And so, what are the technical questions
or just curiosity, like notknowing this world of people
who need an eye like this.
- Yeah.
- You mentioned somethingearlier about fit, right?
(29:59):
And you said if the fit is right,
which conceptually can make sense.
- Yeah.
- But am I right in assumingthat if you have an eye
that fits really well, ittracks with the other eye?
So when you look left or right,
that the fake eye, replacement eye,
however you say that, is tracking with it?
- No.
- Or does it not do that?- No.
(30:21):
So the tracking is incorrelation to, like,
whether a surgeon, if they've had, like,
a trauma of how they've lost their eye,
if the muscles were reattached,
if they've had the eye removed,'cause we fit over both.
There's some where you fit over
where their eye is still there.
So there's been no muscle reattachment.
Sometimes it's shrunken.
And then recently, I just madeone for a lady named Chelsea,
(30:43):
which is on my social media,
and she has a very full globe.
So hers was challenging in particularly
because it was almostas open as her regular,
you know, regular eye.
- Mm-hmm.
- So adding key material to it,
I think hers measured in atlike a half a millimeter thick
or less in certain points.
Very, very thin.
(31:03):
And we have to paint inbetween those layers, too.
So it's very, very thin.
But if someone has their eye removed,
what I'm gonna hold up is a...
They used to be likelittle coral implants.
And this is just plastic.
And there's little tiny,like, places where a muscle
can grow into.
- Oh, I see.- So they'll have-
- Like, deeply sort of textured.
(31:25):
- Yes, so the muscles go-- It feels like it would be
like a very coarse sandpaperykind of feel almost.
- Yeah.- What it looks like.
- So it's more of a plastic.
It feels kind of dull.
So the surgeons will open upthe muscles that you have,
take out the eye, remove themuscles, and then reattach.
And usually they'll put,like, donor tissue over top.
So the inside of a socket,
(31:46):
it's not graphic,
but it looks like theinside of your cheek.
It should look pink whenit's healed properly.
- Okay.
- And healing after your eye's...
Yeah, healing after your eye's removed
is like six to eight weeks.
Depends.
And then if you get,
sometimes if they don't put a implant in,
they'll put a fat graft,
which is usually taken,like, from your buttocks area
(32:06):
or your, like, abdomen.
And that can take upto six months to heal.
So I can't imaginebeing without, you know,
an eye for that long.
That's a really long time.
But they'll take all that out.
And depending on how things have healed,
I take an impression.
I grabbed some other materials.
I like using this stuff called BPS.
(32:27):
It looks terrifying, right?
- Yeah.
- So now the-- For our viewers at home-
- It looks worse on film.
- know that this straightup looks like a hulk gun.
- Right, like I'm ready to go tranquilize
or something, right?
- Right.
Or a laser gun.
Maybe it's part of your-
- Right.- superhero persona.
Like, that's what you...
(Dara laughing)- There we go.
- It becomes a space laser.
(32:47):
- I won't approachsomeone's face with this,
'cause I wouldn't want tobe approached with this.
So a lot of my fittings-- I would go immediately
into defensive mode.
- Yeah, I don't know if Iwould stay in that chair.
- I would assume-- Yeah.
- you're trying to vaporize me.
(Dara laughing)
- It's so bad.
I have a little mixing tipthat'll mix the two parts.
- That I'm not near as afraid of.
- Yeah.(Dara laughing)
- If you think of epoxy,
(33:07):
like, that's like a two-part type thing.
This stuff will go on.
There's two differentmaterials that most people use.
It's alginite, which isa derivative of, like,
seaweed or kelp.
So it sets liquidy.
Or, it'll go in liquidand then set like jello.
So it's kind of a coolmaterial to squish around.
And then there's this, whichwill set a little harder.
(33:28):
But it's better over kindof like a damaged eye,
so it doesn't irritate the socket as much.
And so I'll place some ofthat in a bowl, a mixing bowl,
and then I'll put it on a impression tray,
which I've got like, I don't know,
a whole bunch of impressiontrays that are different shapes
that I insert into the socket,
and it's got, like, a little stem,
(33:49):
and that's where I'llplace the material through
so it kind of fills that area.
And that's where you'll get the movement.
So as long as it fills the area entirely,
you'll be able to capturewhat movement there is.
So, yeah.
- You're saying it kinda-- That's it.
- It kind of has to be near all...
It has to be touching the skin
that has the muscles underneath, or else-
- Yeah.
(34:09):
- there won't be any movement, basically.
- Yep.
Yeah, so, I mean, if you wereto think over your own lid
when you, like, kindof peek under your lid,
that tissue stops and comes back up.
So I'm just filling likea contact, a really big-
- Okay.- area that's contact shape.
Put in maybe like acouple millimeters thick.
That's all it is, yeah.
- I was gonna say that thiskind of Hollywood trope
(34:30):
of the glass eye that's really a marble,
it doesn't sound like that'svery accurate at all that-
- Like this guy right here? (laughs)
- Yeah.
- I mean, I understandwhere they got that.
So this is like a piece ofglass, it's a doll's eye,
and there would be naturally a long stem
where the glass blower wouldbe blowing from the back.
(34:51):
I actually got to watchanother ocularist in Germany.
During the pandemic we gotto do virtual conferences,
which was really cool inthe ocularistry field.
And so they would create the iris,
and then they would create the back of it,
and they would literally,like, take these calibers,
not these, but their own,
and they would, while it was hot,
(35:12):
kind of, like, squishit in certain directions
and capture that person's eye.
And if it didn't match up perfectly,
they would just cast itaside and make another one
because you can't go back in with glass.
And I believe that's wherethe term stock eye came from.
So stock eyes are also a thing
(35:32):
where I've seen some people still,
they're made, like, Ithink India and Mexico
and a few other places still make them,
but it's something I usuallypush to stay away from
because if a stock eyedoesn't fit correctly,
that implant that you have in your socket
can rub through the tissueand you can have an exposure.
(35:53):
- Oh.
- Which is it coming through the surface.
And that's why I, like, emphasizeon the fit being well fit.
Not so much with the movement.
I mean, I hope that, you know,they've got great movement,
and for the most part, I usually have,
most people do show up,so I usually am able
to check everything,
or I'll work with theirocularist when they get a fun eye
(36:16):
and make sure that they're seen
to make sure everything fits properly.
'Cause yeah, we don't want exposures
and we don't want to risk that.
And I think that's important, too,
because it's funny, I wasthinking about that the other day.
Someone said, "Well, couldn'tyou just ship something out?
Couldn't you just makesomething?" You know?
And I go, "No, I can't do a prefabbed one
(36:38):
because if it rubs, that couldlead to so many problems."
And also being board certified, you know,
you gotta watch all that because-
- Right.- Yeah.
- there's making eyes andthere's doing a good job.
You don't want to do adisservice to the community,
and yeah, that's it.
- So is what I'm hearing that in the US
(36:58):
there was a time whenthey were more, like,
circular and marble like,
and then they became thisidea of doing them more
like flat concave, or have,
in the US have they always been more
of the concave-like ones like you make?
- Yeah, I think they'vealways been concave.
I think that's just Hollywoodmaking them circular.
(37:20):
I don't know why.- Okay.
- It's just, you know,and some people come in
and their loved ones come in and go,
"Well, we thought you werejust gonna give them a ball."
- Yeah.- "What happened?" You know?
(Dara laughing)
- Yeah, I mean, I still hearpeople get that impression-
- Yeah.- 'cause I could think like
even a couple years ago in like"Avengers: Endgame" you see-
(37:42):
- Right.
- Or maybe that was-- Oh my gosh.
- No, that's "Infinity War."
It's an orb.
- Was it the...
An orb, but also, if you've noticed
during the "Infinity War,"I forget which one exactly,
one of the Avengers, the father.
Oh no, it was, what is the...
(38:03):
"Black Panther."
The father in that is actuallywearing a prosthetic eye.
- Oh, he is?
- I remember watching that in the theater-
Oh, yeah.
When it goes to, like, thescene where he's, like,
kinda like passed along and dead,
that's been interesting because, like,
I looked at my partner and I go,
(38:24):
"Do you see he's wearing a prosthetic eye?
They could not have just paid someone
to make him a better eye?
Are you kidding me? Withall these visual effects?"
I'm like-- Funny.
- "Get the poor man a better eye."
But anytime there's eyes in a movie,
oh, I get hit up all the time.
All the time.
But yeah, my coworker sent me a note.
She says the role for theeyeballs was for dramatic effect.
(38:46):
I was like, "This is verytrue. This is very true."
(Dara laughing)
And then-- Well, and-
- Yeah. Oh, go ahead.
- Oh, I was just gonna say
I'm very glad to have thattrope cleared up, by the way.
Like, literally as a layperson,
this concept of sort of an initial implant
that you're puttingsomething over the top of
and that it's not just a round, you know,
(39:08):
oblong marble or somethingthat you're sticking in there-
- You'll just pop a marble in.
- Like, I would have made a fool of myself
before this conversation.- Yeah.
- In what I know.- Yeah, yeah.
- So I think that's a...
I appreciate having that all cleared up.
That's great.- Yeah, exactly.
- And you know what, Hollywood'sHollywood, so let them.
(Dara laughing)
They need that eye to roll away and to-
- Yes.
(39:28):
- try to chase it for it to be funny.
- Exactly, exactly.- Your eyes are fun,
but they're not funny,'cause they don't roll away.
So, you know, we'llleave that to Hollywood.
- Yeah.(Mark laughing)
Well, or Rachel, 'cause she'll throw them.
I'm like, "Just wait."- Oh.
Beaming somebody with youreyeball just sounds like fun
no matter what shape it is.
(Dara laughing)That's fine.
- Yeah, absolutely.
(39:49):
Little kids love doing that.
The little kids usually will-- Wait, really?
- And, like, chuck them.
Or the best is they'll takethem out, they'll chuck them,
or they'll bite them, or something weird.
- Oh.- Oh my gosh.
Little kids are funny.
But, yeah, yeah.
- Well, listen, this conversationhas been incredibly fun.
And like I said, I wouldnever have predicted
that a conversation with what I now know
(40:10):
is called an ocularist,did I say that right?
- Yes.
Yes, you did.
- What's that? Swedish?
Would be so much fun.
So thank you for such a fun conversation.
Thank you for enlightening us.
This is what we love about thispodcast is we learn so much.
And we've learned a coupleof our preconceptions here
are completely wrong,
(40:31):
from the shape of aneye that you would make
to just how exciting andfun and artistic your career
is and can be.
And I think it's just amazing,
amazing how you've stretchedthe boundaries of what you do
(40:52):
in a way that's just touched other people
in the way it has.
And you know, so kudos to you for that.
Anything that you didn'tbring up or that we didn't say
or that you feel likeyou should reemphasize
before we part ways?
- No, I think we covered,like, a lot of bases.
I think that was reallyinformative, actually.
(41:13):
I think, yeah.
- Well, maybe, did youlearn anything, Christina?
(Dara laughing)
Or was it just...
I think Dara and I did allthe learning for everyone
if I had guess. (laughs)
- Yeah.- Yeah.
Well no, it's sometimes niceto hear, like, the other side,
'cause that's somethingI'm also exploring is,
like, what other people perceive us as,
(41:33):
or what they perceive prosthetics as,
or what they look like,or how they're made.
It's nice to hear that side.
No matter how manyyears I've been in this,
it's just refreshing to hear, you know,
like the typical questions 'cause-
- Yeah.
- it helps me know what to answer
or what could be a questionto someone who's embarrassed
about asking that question.
(41:53):
So, yeah.
- Yeah.
- You want to know what peopleare thinking in their head,
and just, like, waitingand just not saying-
- Yeah.- kind of deal.
- I mean, we all have knowledge bias-
- Absolutely.
- based on whatever it isthat we know really well.
And I think sometimes it's nice to revisit
that perspective of somebodywho's just not exposed
to everything that you-
- Yeah.- deal with every day.
(42:15):
- The beginner.
- Yeah, the beginner.
- Yeah, yeah.
Exactly.
- Well, thank you so much.
- Awesome.
- A really fun conversation.- Yeah.
- Really appreciate youand all that you've done.
- It was great having you on today.
- It absolutely was.
- Cool.
- Well, this is Mark Miller-- Thanks. (laughs)
- thanking Christina and Dara
and reminding you allto keep it accessible.
(42:41):
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the experts in digital accessibility.
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