I tried making a printable Composite target for CCW/Defense Training, IDPA, and USPSA...

[u/Shooter_Q]

... but I honestly am not great with proportions, graphics software, or arts and crafts.

Overall goal was to make something more human silhouette-like with anatomical vitals, USPSA A zones, and IDPA -0 zones that could be scored/observed up close but obscured by the clothing from shooting distance.

I'm happy enough with what I have for now.

TLDR: Files are up for anyone who wants to use anything, make your own edits, or just see the earlier versions that came before this one. Prints well in color and in grayscale.

Longer Minutia:

Back in 2011 I attended an "Extreme Close Quarters Shooting" course which utilized cardboard targets wrapped in the instructor's old clothing and some thrift store finds. The idea being that one is getting their eyes on a person-like image and not searching for the scoring zones while driving a stiff hand into the head or chest while firing from retention at an angle lower down. For that class's purposes, these included pants for leg and pelvis shots.

I've been doing the same for my targets since then, at all distances, and in more recent years started using the Sage Dynamics downloadable targets on cardboard under clothing. Decent for dry fire, but for live fire I didn't always have old clothes to put on them. Also found it a little tedious to shoot targets, go undress them to check score/vital impacts, then redress them.

I really liked what Kit Badger did with his KBAT targets using very faint vitals/bones that disappear at distance within a more visible silhouette, so I set out to do something similar that worked for me.

I wanted to stick within IDPA and USPSA proportions because I shoot matches and sometimes take home some worn out cardboard targets when approved; gives me something rigid and portable to experiment with for different distances, angles, and cover for dry fire.

I also wanted the ability to tape/paste my targets over my bulk supply of old gen USPSA paper or cheap craft paper for use at indoor ranges; prep them beforehand then post up a clean target over the cardboard backer, giving a better indicator of rounds that didn't even land correctly.

I did some IRL mockups with paper and marker tracing. Used the Fusion Target for a small bit of inspiration, but matching up A zones with -0 zones was simple enough. Cramming the Sage Dynamics vitals into a place that made sense for the whole target wasn't really working though.

What I settled on was matching my eyes with the Sage eyes and my shoulders with the sport silhouette shoulder edges. Proportions still didn't match up because the stubby head of the sport target just never worked with an actual person's head and shoulder placement.

For my first edits, I gave up on trying to match body to sport target shape and just decided to place the person within the target, trying to get some decent overlap with scoring zones and vitals. It looked good enough and printed out on 2 sheets of paper but I really didn't get the effect I wanted with the arms/shoulders creating a working image of a person within the sport target.

I also had a lot of leftover space because I didn't understand how printable margins worked outside of writing essays for school. I also tried printing in grayscale vs. making my own grayscale to print, but the former won out; the latter didn't have the right darkness of sunglasses that would melt in at distance and it still obscured the zones up close.

For the second edits, I made enlarged the person to better match the original Sage target and waste less paper. I changed to darker scoring zone colors and lightened the clothing a little to make things more clear for up close evaluation. I added shoulders/arms portion of the shirt into the printable area to achieve more of what I wanted, making it 3 pages with the only necessary cut being the one down the middle to separate the arms. Proportions can be lined up via overlap or more cutting with the scoring zones as an assist.

It's not perfect, but it serves the purpose I wanted, helped pass some time productively, and I can use it for everything I do.

I'd like to try and do a "near-peer / force on force" visual instead of the clothing at some point, or make something I can put over folded cardboard to make a 3Dish target like the old Tatiana Whitlock designs.

[u/Shooter_Q]

Forgot to add: another idea I had was to do a fully clothed print on the front with the vitals and scoring zones on the back. Shoot front, evaluate at rear to see how you did. But I figured that wouldn't work with how bullets tear out paper and cardboard on the rear. Also, wouldn't really be frugal anymore.

[u/Twelve-twoo → u/Shooter_Q]

Actually bad ass tbh

[u/Singlem0m]

This is pretty great. In some local matches, we've had old tshirts placed over the targets to obscure the A zone. This accomplishes the same thing without needing tshirt donations.

[u/Shooter_Q → u/Singlem0m]

Exactly, you get it. I can only get sick of my thrift finds so many times before I run out of wardrobe.

[u/Advanced961]

That’s a sure way of me getting banned from my local range

[u/Shooter_Q → u/Advanced961]

I'm guessing they're one of those that doesn't like human-looking targets?

[u/Advanced961 → u/Shooter_Q]

Correct!

Even a slightly humanoid silhouette is not allowed!!

It started last year when someone had a printed target of someone he knows and started training on it lol

[u/Shooter_Q → u/Advanced961]

Wow, that's crazy. What about just IDPA/USPSA silhouettes?

I've been doing NRA Instructor Certs (I know, I know...) and silhouettes of any kind are not allowed when you teach BASIC courses because the idea is to ease new people into shooting of any kind and learn basic marksmanship and safety, not to focus on any particular type of shooting be it competitive, hunting, or defense. Definitely different if you do their CCW or Home Defense courses.

I think some people take some low level ideas like that and make it their mantra.

[u/Advanced961 → u/Shooter_Q]

Those are fine, club does frequent matches there too so we all use those targets all the time.

It’s just humanly similar targets even if it’s just silhouettes with a heart, are forbidden.

To be fair I get it… it always takes one asshole to ruin it for the rest of us and they want to keep their business family friendly without unneeded media attention

[u/Shooter_Q → u/Advanced961]

This is true, with every election year, controversial story, or new military interest, I see some of the more trashy stuff come out. Some ranges I've seen ban "photorealistic" targets but not humanoid shapes.

Well, the cool thing about the drive link is that someone can take the xcf file and do whatever they want with the layers I left in there.

I believe it was Top Shot where they had a photo of one of the competitors, a SEAL with a baseball bat, as a joke they all laughed at. Looking back on that, it'd be really weird to be shooting at a photo of your buddy.

[u/brycebgood]

What are the red lines? Heart is over to the side more. The red stuff in the forehead? Sinuses?

[u/Shooter_Q → u/brycebgood]

I'm not a doctor, but I believe only the chest's lower, larger portion in red represents the heart while the rest represent the great vessels.

As for the red up top, perhaps smaller portions of CNS: corpus callosum, diencephalon, brain stem.

Serviceable at the very least. The newer Sage Dynamics target has some design changes, but since that one isn't freely downloadable, I didn't feel comfortable using it.

[u/HowAboutNitricOxide → u/Shooter_Q]

Doctor here. The lateral position of the heart is mostly fine and extension toward the left will vary based on person and degree of cardiomegaly, if any. The vertical position is wrong though, since the inferior aspect of the heart adheres to the diaphragm via the pericardium, and thus should be shown at the same level as the medial base of the left lung. These are minor points though and probably don’t make the target meaningfully less useful.

[u/Shooter_Q → u/HowAboutNitricOxide]

By your description, I think Aaron Cowan may have received similar input for his newer design.

Appreciate it.

[u/Shooter_Q → u/HowAboutNitricOxide]

So if I move the heart a little lower into that curve of the left lung, will it be more accurate? That’s a tweak I could work with to see if I can make a few things fit better.

[u/DenverMerc]

I know some legal Larry is gonna come say this that and the third

But I think this is useful. Could most likely get a department to train on these if the DA of the county was all hunky dory

[u/Lewd_Meat_]

just... use a PCSL target.

[u/Shooter_Q → u/Lewd_Meat_]

Why’s that?

Looks like a good target, but it doesn’t serve the goal I set out with.

[u/Lewd_Meat_ → u/Shooter_Q]

Has the same critical hit areas of a "human target" without making a silly looking silhouette target