Spectacles: the augmented reality glasses by Snapchat

Snapchat makes a step forward in the realization of the smart glasses for the virtual reality. After the first models, which were thought mainly to shot pictures and to record short videos, now here you have the Spectacles for content creators, to allow them to see the world through the Lens that they are realizing.

First models of Spectacles

The Spectacles by Snap Inc. (rightly, the company of the famous social Snapchat) arrive to the fourth generation, but they aren’t available yet. They were just announced and the company promises that they will suddenly change the way to see the world.

Meanwhile, the top of the line of the smart glasses by Snapchat are the third generation Spectacles. These already, in reality, a little jewel of technology.

With the Spectacles 3, infact, it’s possible to take pictures and to realize small videos and then to live them in 3D. This model is on sale and it’s available for everyone.

But the Spectacles of fourth generation are not. This special model was thought for the authors, the content creators. Everyone can send a request to the app Snapchat, through the dedicated form, to receive the Spectacles.

A glass for the content creators

“Thanks to the help of some authors of augmented reality, we are discovering new models to melt together fun and utility through the immersive AR. The new Spectacles are not for sale. They are thought for the authors that want to pass the limits of the immersive AR experience”.

The glasses developed by Snap allow the content creators to see the world while they are still creating it. These new glasses with 3D lens weights 134 grams.

The content creators can always bring with them the world of Snapchat thanks to these new smart glasses, with a design very similar to the one of the sun glass and a battery that lasts about 30 minutes.

The creators, then, can use the app Lens Studio, which is connected to the Spectacles.

“Let’s create the world that you want to watch with the Spectacles, our first pair of glasses able to give life to the augmented reality, by redefining the way we interact with the surrounder environment and we overlap to it the informatic”.

How do the Spectacles work

To better understand the functioning of the new glasses Spectales, we must remember how the application of Snapchat works. It is a social platform which focal point are the “Lens” with which we can overlap the graphic elements to the real ones shoted with the camera of the smartphone.

Thanks to the Spectacles this special world created by Snapchat appears even throught the lens of the glasses and the content creators are able to see the world while they are still creating it.

To overlap the digital contents to the real world, the glasses use two display with wave guide 3D. They are perfect for the outside, with a maximum lightness of 2000 nit.

The latence is very low (only 12 milliseconds), so to make the overlapping of the images basically in realtime. The Spectacles has a processor Qualcomm Snapdragon XR1.

The glasses are, therefore, equipped with two cameras RGB, 4 microphones and 2 stereo speakers. About the hardware of these special smartglasses there is the integrated touch control inside the side rodes.

“The touchpad of Spectacles, which is placed next to the forehead, allows to show and to launch Lens Carousel, by allowing the content creators to experiment many Lens, included the ones made by them with the Lens Studio.

The right button activates Scan, that joins what the creators are watching through the Spectacles and the most relevant Lens. Voice Scan therefore allows to the content creators to use the vocal commands to view some kind of Lens, all of it without the need to use the hands. 

By touching the left button, instead, the creators can catch Snaps of 10 seconds and share them straight by the Spectacles: a LED light clearly indicates when the record is ongoing”.

This post is also available in: Italiano