- [Marc] I don't know what it is
about flying that's so romantic,
but something about, you know,
the combo of man and machine
working together to defy gravity,
and the fact that I've never been able to do it,
is really awesome to me, and I'm super excited.
I'm Marc Muszynski, I have cone rod dystrophy,
which is a macular degeneration
where your central vision is lost,
and then the rest of your eyesight is,
as the name would imply, degenerate.
I was diagnosed officially when I was in kindergarten,
because that's the first year that
they do the visual eye exam.
At first, it didn't make too big of a difference
because as a kid, you don't fully get it.
People would tell me things like,
you might not be able to drive, and I was like,
(scoffs)
We'll figure out something by then.
All I wanted to do was be a test pilot,
and then eventually an astronaut,
and go into space, but preferably to another planet.
I remember maybe telling my parents, or telling a teacher,
and they would, you know,
try to explain to the best of their ability
that these are jobs that require eyesight,
and although it's not fair, that's the way the world works.
I was like, of course that's the way your world works,
but whatever, I'll figure this out.
So what I remember is applying for
visually impaired week at space camp.
And I went, and what I remember
was having the time of my life,
and realizing as I left that I knew exactly why
you needed to have perfect vision to be an astronaut.
I remember flying home and going like,
"I'm really glad I did that,
"and I'm really sad that I'll never get to do that again."
- So my name's Taylor West, I'm director
of outreach at a company called eSight.
eSight uses a videocamera that captures an image,
we take it, run it through a computer,
and enhance it in different ways
to make it better for someone that's legally blind.
And then display it on little screens just on the inside,
so people can wear it just like normal glasses.
We found Marc by actually, through Buzzfeed.
I saw his video, and he's exactly
the kind of person we can often help.
So I think it's gonna be a great technology for him.
- When they asked me what I would do
if I could see well, I said, I wanted to fly an airplane.
Because, of course, car.
Like, everyone wants to drive a car, who can't drive a car.
But I figured, this is my one day.
So I'm gonna skip right over that step,
and take to the skies.
What's cool is like, I can actually see your face
in detail, that I would never see
anyone's face while talking to them.
We're here at Santa Monica Airport to fly a plane.
I watched Top Gun last night,
so that's basically research, right?
With eSight, I should be able to see both my environment,
and then also the information, the instruments,
on the plane, so that I'll actually have the same chance
as anyone else to successfully fly.
- Alright, so when we go flying with Marc,
it's gonna be awesome.
I've never actually done anything like this before,
so it's gonna be new for me.
I'm gonna kinda test out as we go,
but I'm gonna kinda just have him follow me
on the controls for a little while, get him to feel it,
get a feel for the airplane, and then after that,
a little hands-off, let him do it,
and just give him, you know, verbal instructions,
and he's gonna hopefully be able to see
some of the instruments, so the goal is to just be able
to sit there and let him fly the airplane.
- It was awesome.
We got up in the air, and then AJ showed me how to turn,
how pulling up and down, just general plane manuvering
information that was pretty necessary.
- [AJ] He did great.
I pretty much just sat back there and gave him instruction,
it was, it actually didn't take him very long to pick it up,
it was, we took off, I just told him,
I was kinda giving him an idea of
how very little you have to move the stick.
I mean, after that, I just kinda let go,
I didn't say anything at first,
got the airplane nice and trimmed up,
and then I would just give him little instructions,
and he was actually maneuvering the plane fully by himself,
for, I'd say, about 10 minutes straight
without me even touching it, just by verbal,
just telling him what to do, little bit of left,
little bit of right, little bit up, down.
He was doing full 360's out over Malibu,
but it was great, I mean, he flew for most of the part,
it was a nice flight for me,
I just got to sit back and enjoy.
- I mean, what's crazy is having something like this.
It gave me the confidence to fly.
And that trust in yourself,
and that trust from others,
allows you to do things that you didn't
think you'd be able to do otherwise.
So, thanks to AJ and thanks to eSight,
you know, I got to live that dream.
(powerful music)