> Mirrors help, video helps, we are not ourselves, once you realize that, optimization becomes much easier.
It's funny, in two of the areas I've worked in (tailoring and illustration) I was taught techniques that are analogues to this. With illustration, if you draw from a reference, one of the ways to improve accuracy is to turn the reference image upside down, which basically stops your brain seeing it as the thing it is an image of. Instead it becomes a structure of shapes, it's easier to draw. With tailoring, when cutting on a model/dummy, I was taught to continually check the work in a mirror instead of always looking directly at it -- again, I think a way to stop the brain automatically filling in structures and shapes, to force it to see the piece as a whole from a different perspective.
I was trained (and worked, for a short time) in tailoring/fashion, and was also trained and worked (for a longer time) as a designer and illustrator. I was just taught to do this as a matter of course (by tutors and by technicians). It's just finding ways to trick your brain into actually thinking about things instead of relying on (habitually ingrained) automatic movements which tend to cause you to miss obvious errors.
Re illustration, this is quite common when explaining how to draw from a reference picture. Not at any detailed length as far as I can ever remember, literally just "turn the photograph upside down when you're drawing from it" (doesn't really need much explanation, that just how it works). As far as introductory books go I can remember "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" goes through this.
Re tailoring, the issue is that you tend to fuck up the balance of things in 3D when you're sitting staring at specific bits of it, even when you step back you only tend to see what you want if you've been at it for a while. You need to be able to see it from a. different angles at the same time, and b. not just directly through your eyes
The non-dominant hand will work for what you're doing, it's a good thing to do I think (in a way I wish I'd been taught to practise using my right more when I was a child). The reference image technique is specifically to increase accuracy though, so slightly different aim
It's funny, in two of the areas I've worked in (tailoring and illustration) I was taught techniques that are analogues to this. With illustration, if you draw from a reference, one of the ways to improve accuracy is to turn the reference image upside down, which basically stops your brain seeing it as the thing it is an image of. Instead it becomes a structure of shapes, it's easier to draw. With tailoring, when cutting on a model/dummy, I was taught to continually check the work in a mirror instead of always looking directly at it -- again, I think a way to stop the brain automatically filling in structures and shapes, to force it to see the piece as a whole from a different perspective.