There’s no danger that you’ll be mistaken for some nerdy person from the future, since the looks are just as good as the features. They also come in a range of different colours and lens combinations that mean you can get access to the smartest glasses you’ll ever own in whatever design you’d like. The camera is just the beginning of the smarts that are integrated into the Ray-Ban Stories. It includes a wide variety of other features that mean they are the smartest glasses you’ll ever have worn, in a variety of ways.
The WIRED conversation illuminates how technology is changing every aspect of our lives—from culture to business, science to design. The breakthroughs and innovations that we uncover lead to new ways of thinking, new connections, and new industries. Facebook’s slowness may have been intentional; Andrew Bosworth, who runs the company’s Reality Labs, has said multiple times that the company doesn’t want to “surprise” people as it introduces new technologies. This has been in response to Facebook’s move-fast-and-break-things mantra, its questionable data-collection practices, and its cascade of somewhat impotent privacy settings. Where Facebook goes next with glasses is the interesting part.
Chromance lenses are made out of polycarbonate and enhance color and details so your world looks more vivid and high-def. They are also polarized and have anti-reflective coating to reduce glare. 3-point fit touches your head on your nose and behind both earsOakley’s signature straight temple arms work because the temple tips hug your head rather than holding on behind your ears. You’ll also find several wraparound shield frames in addition to low-profile half-rim sports sunglasses, whereas the majority of Ray-Bans are full-rim frames. Oakley makes frames with the same basic components, but they also create their own proprietary materials like the lightweight, indestructible O Matter™ frame and Unobtainium™ temple and nosepad grips. For Hollywood royalty or a rock n’ roll vibe that will dazzle poolside or make a fashion statement for a night on the town, Ray-Ban is where it’s at.
As you’d expect from Ray-Ban, even with all of those smarts inside these glasses look incredible smart, too. You can choose from three of its classic styles – the Wayfarer, Round or Meteor – all of which pack in the same quality, luxury and fine design that the company is so well known for. You can speak to them, too, with voice control that’s powered by the Facebook intelligence that is built into these clubmaster glasses. Unlike carrying a phone or a devoted camera, you won’t have to reach into your pocket and pull it out, by which point the moment is probably gone. And you don’t have to hold a device in front of your face, taking yourself out of the moment so that you don’t really get to experience it the first time around. In many ways, Ray-Ban Stories look just like any other of the brand’s glasses.
The video and photos are stored locally on your phone, not sent into Facebook’s servers or the cloud. Basically, if you don’t choose to post those photos to Facebook, Facebook can’t see them or have anything to do with them, which is probably what you want. Well, if you buy Facebook glasses, I don’t really know what you want. Ray-Ban Stories can take photos and videos with a touch of a button and send them to your phone. On sunny days I do wear sunglasses when I play tennis so it was an added bonus that I could take videos while hitting groundstrokes and volleys.
Because it’s not an in-ear speaker, you can hear some outside noise — I find this actually great for walking around when you do want to be slightly aware of your surroundings, and it’s probably also great for biking. For clarity’s sake, ray ban caravan I will herein refer to Ray-Ban Stories as “Facebook glasses,” because that’s exactly what I know you are thinking when you read this. The words “Facebook” and “glasses” are making the hair on the back of your neck stand up, right?
Yet the tech companies that have pursued these ideas have often failed to achieve them, as people have shunned wearable computers — especially on their faces. News Corp is a global, diversified media and information services company focused on creating and distributing authoritative and engaging content and other products and services. Alex Himel, VP of AR at Facebook Reality Labs, informed me over a Zoom chat that taping over the LED light was a violation of the terms of service of the glasses, which prohibit tampering with the device.
Ray-Ban and Facebook Ray-Ban is hoping to fix all of these design issues with their new smart glasses called Ray-Ban Stories launched in partnership with Facebook. The classic Wayfarer’s get a technological upgrade with a discreet camera that can take photographs and videos through voice command or with a touch button on the temples. Ray-Ban Stories glasses also have speakers that let you listen to music in lieu of earbuds.
I’m fastidious about putting my sunglasses back in their case when I take them off so I don’t break them, so I kept them well charged up. There are speakers in the arms of the glasses; they’re activated by touch, easy to use, and a surprisingly great feature. I went for a stroll listening to an audiobook , and it was oddly nice to not hassle with AirPods.
Ray-Ban continues to offer a variety of traditional, contemporary and performance sunglasses and eyeglasses styles for men, women and kids. After testing out the Ray-Ban Stories for a few days, I found them far more compelling than any smart glasses today. They don’t look as goofy as the Snap Spectacles, and they’re far more comfortable to wear than Bose and Amazon’s Frames. I could only use the Stories in limited situations though, since I need prescription lenses to actually see well.