Those controls can be used to take photos or record videos, as you might expect, but you can also play and pause your songs. Similar to the RB4165F Justin, you may have noticed the “F” on this Clubmaster’s model clubmaster number. However, in its largest size, the 55, we actually get a larger lens. As for the nose bridge, we lose 2 mm in comparison to the Standard Fit, but this is inconsequential due to the adjustable nose pad.
The Ray-Ban Stories are a fine first attempt at smart glasses by Facebook. It’s great that the company teamed up with a brand people will actually want to wear. Facebook’s glasses look fashionable, not dorky, and aren’t obviously equipped with technology. That’s a big achievement for pair of smart glasses sold by a tech company.
With Ray-Ban Stories, it has gained new capabilities to collect data about people’s behavior, location, and content—even if the company doesn’t use that information yet—as it works toward loftier goals. When some of the people we interact with are cloaked in Ray-Ban Stories, we may not be able to fully cooperate with each other. Or if we don’t own Facebook’s glasses, or aren’t on Facebook, we may not be able to participate in social activities in the same way as those with Ray-Ban Stories. Zuckerberg explained it as a shared space that unifies many companies and mediated experiences, including real, virtual, and augmented worlds.
He said there’s “definitely some concerns” that people didn’t appear to notice that I was capturing pictures and videos — something that would be more obvious if I had pulled out my phone. Facebook lent me a pair of Ray-Ban Stories with sunglass lenses so I could decide for myself. After about a week of trying them out, it’s clear the glasses look and feel very much like a regular pair of shades.
Protect your eyes from the sun’s UV rays with crystalline vision in classy cat-eye frames or throwback Clubmasters. The glasses aren’t a stand-alone product, so music and calls are streamed to the glasses from an iPhone or Android phone via Bluetooth. Facebook is requiring the use of an iPhone or Android app called Facebook View, which is used to manage and set up the glasses. When a user takes a photo or video, the media will appear in a section of the app. A user can then choose to download that photo or video to their device for storage and editing. The glasses’ nicest surprise might be the tiny speakers embedded in the rear of each temple.
The touchpad on the side of the frame is a welcome inclusion for volume adjustment. With their core ability of taking photos and videos, Ray-Ban Stories are essentially a sleeker version of Snapchat’s Spectacles, which first debuted in 2016 to a lot of hype that quickly fizzled. These Ray-Bans don’t have displays in the lenses, like the latest Spectacles that were unveiled earlier this year.
Ray-Ban Stories, the smart glasses being debuted by Facebook and Ray-Ban today, are most notable for just how much they look like a standard pair of the brand’s sunglasses. This is a major launch for Facebook, which announced early details about the Ray-Ban partnership and product at its AR/VR-focused developer conference last September. The company has indicated that the device is a stepping stone for its AR ambitions and an effort to get users acquainted with the idea of high-tech glasses. The glasses notably do not have in-lens displays that will allow users to see digital augmented reality content like competitor Snap’s latest Spectacles prototype.
The glasses will collect data that Facebook says it needs, like battery life and Wi-Fi information, plus a user’s login credentials for a required Facebook account. Users will also have the option to share more data, including the number of photos they have taken and the length of videos. Ray-Ban Stories, a pair of $299 smart glasses built by Facebook and EsillorLuxottica, can be used to take photos and videos, play music, and take calls. Also, while the models we were given to test were sunglasses with tinted lenses, Facebook is offering 20 different configurations with three Ray-Ban frame shapes , including clear-lensed versions. Snap first launched sunglasses with an integrated video camera in September 2016.
They also have small speakers that turn the smart glasses into headphones for listening to music and podcasts via Bluetooth from the smartphone they’re paired with. And they include ray ban caravan microphones, so you can talk on the phone through them. Most smart glasses have unusually large temples to accommodate all the necessary sensors and chips and batteries.