While Google Glass is a leader in its field, it lacks on one thing: attraction and applicability to that of sports and athletes.  While it is water resistant, it is not the toughest of products and probably wouldn’t hold up to someone dripping sweat for long periods of time.  Recon Instruments saw the obvious hole in the market and developed the Jet.  The Jet is a pair of sport sunglasses with an integrated Android powered display that has an endless amount of possibilities.

Recon, previously known for its MOD ski goggle inserts, takes the idea one step further and applies the same technology to a sporting pair of shades with a list of supped up features.  They also added a huge amount of connectivity options and sensors, it comes with WiFi, Bluetooth, an accelerometer, thermometer, GPS and most exciting, ANT+.  These features will allow the shades to gather data from different capturing sources such as heart rate monitors, cycling power and cadence.

Strava users will be chomping at the bit to get this technology with the ability to get real-time displays of everything they desire.  Engaget tried a pair of prototypes and described the glasses as a bit flimsy and stating they had a difficult time seeing the display.  But keep in mind this was a pre-production prototype and I’m sure they will work out some of the bugs and finalize a marketable product.  The removable battery is said to have a projected life of six hours, way more than I would need to get winded!

The Recon Instruments Jet is set to ship by the end of the year and we have no official release of expected price, though some speculation it will cost around $500 — give or take a hundred or so.  Seems a bit steep, but those that already spend thousands on their bikes and gear will have no problem dropping that much for the real-time applications and training possibilities.

[ source ]

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If all goes well for one team of American scientists, you may soon have to free up another USB port to charge – this may sound absurd – your sunglasses.

Using a pair of tinted LCD screens as lenses and a visual censor in the bridge, Dynamic Eye’s prototype sunglasses blot out the sun, headlights and other intense light sources in your field of vision while the rest of the lens remains much less tinted.

“If you’re driving into the sun, it’ll dim down the sun without dimming down everything that you want to see,” says founder Chris Mullin in a demo video. That’s exactly how the idea struck him: driving into the sun both ways on his daily commute in California.

“The sun was always somewhere in my field of view,” Mullin says. Luckily, while attending the University of California in Berkley for his PhD in physics, he specialized in lasers, optics, and liquid crystals. With this education, it wasn’t hard to connect the proverbial dots – or design sunglasses that put a less proverbial dot directly between your pupil and the sun.

He’s right about one thing. Squinting for a prolonged period of time can be painful. But there are not many people who would leave the privacy of their homes wearing anything that remotely resembles the somewhat obnoxious prototype.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a cool idea. But judging by the company’s website, ugly is how Dynamic Eye rolls at the moment. With a bit of funding and some clever concepts, we’re sure the Dynamic Eye will be a big success.

[Kickstarter via Dynamic Eye]

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The crazy kooks at Calvin Klein have decided that it might be a good idea to embed a USB flash drive into their latest creation, so that’s where we find ourselves today. When in its “normal” position, these sunglasses look like any other pair of eye-protecting shades. However, they hide a secret.

Along the right side, you’ll find that you can actually detach the back portion to reveal a fully functional 4GB USB flash drive. That’s certainly more discreet than the functionality you’d get with a set of Oakley Thump MP3 sunglasses… but not quite as useful.

Further still, you won’t be able to use the flash drive while still wearing your pair of Calvin Klein USB sunglasses, but I guess you shouldn’t be wearing your shades when staring at a computer monitor anyway. The USB Calvin Klein shades retail for $199.

Source: OhGizmo

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