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If you ask anyone what the purpose of eyeglasses is, they’re likely to tell you that it’s to improve one’s vision; however, we’ve since progressed beyond this. This is because eyeglass makers, internet pioneers, and battery manufacturers, such as YOK Energy, have joined forces to create smart glasses. So, what are smart glasses? Essentially, they’re an attempt to bring the imaging and connectivity of computers into the lenses and frames of our eyewear.
How Do Smart Glasses Work?
As one can imagine, there are various features of smart glasses, including smarts, sound, mic, projector and prism, and camera. This sounds like a lot of features for such a slimline device to handle, so how exactly does every feature work?
Every computerised apparatus needs a “brain” that powers all the features of the device. In technical terms, this is called the central processing unit (CPU), which can be found in the arm of one ear rest.
As far as sound is concerned, the speaker for smartphone reception and wireless audio inputs sits at the end of the ear rests. As a result, bone conduction is responsible for the transference of audio, rather than air conduction via the audio canal.
After sound, the mic is the next object of concern. Well, the mic can be found under one hinge, in which the mic can be paired with a micro speaker for audio feedback. This allows for the listening of podcasts, music, and other audio media.
So, you can hear audio and you can speak into the mic, but what about seeing projections? Well, the projection method can be found above the upper part of the lens and provides partly transparent digital displays without hindering the real-world perception. This is achieved via a curved mirror combiner.
Last but not least is the camera, which is located at the temple of smart glasses. Despite this, not all smart glasses contain cameras, as some backlash has been received about people being filmed without their permission.
Powered By Speech, Touch, or Thoughts
So, smart glasses can do all of these amazing things, but how do you actually get them to do these things? Well, you can swipe, tap, or touch controls that are built into the frames, verbalize your requests, or utilize gesture recognition features by nodding or looking up and down. There has even been evidence to suggest that it won’t be long until smart glasses can be controlled via our thoughts.
Improved Vision
Of course, the main role of glasses is to see better, and this hasn’t been overlooked in the development of smart glasses. Various models have incorporated liquid crystal technology to filter brightness, which helps optimize one’s vision.
Reducing Price, Boosting Style, Adding AR
Currently, smart glasses are far from affordable, meaning that you won’t encounter many average joes in street with a pair. Therefore, for smart glasses to become more accessible, they need to be manufactured much more cheaply. Similarly, they’re not currently the most fashion forward of accessories, meaning that the appearance of them may have to improve before everyone is rushing to grab a pair. Last but not least, developers are looking to incorporate augmented reality (AR) technology in order to livestream digital images.
In short, we’re just at the beginning of the smart glasses journey, and we’re sure to see many more developments in years to come.
The Challenges
Since they’re still a relatively new concept, smart glasses also present many challenges. These are in regard to education, vision awareness, safety, security, and fashion. In order to make waves, everyone of these areas will need to be addressed.
