The Optical Vision Site

Speech To Text Eyeglasses

With these glasses you can see what other people are saying to you via 2 microphones that capture the sound. The Device filters the speech out and uses speech to text translation software. By Mads S. Hindhede

Photo;Yanko Design

Photo; Yanko Design

SpeKx Eyewear Can’t Get Patent

For budding eyewear designers- it’s hard to get a Patent according to CBS Evening News and Spekx Eyewear.

Entrepreneur Aldo DiBelardino started developing lightweight “Spekx” eyewear four years ago in an office above his garage in Virginia Beach, Va. He gave CBS News an exclusive sneak peek at his invention before they went on sale.

“They provide you goggle-like protection, but they provide you the style and convenience of sunglasses,” DeBelardino says.

DiBelardino is preparing to start selling them this summer. But the trouble is, he does not have a patent to protect his invention. He applied for one in April.

“Until I get a patent, I have a very limited ability to defend myself in the marketplace against copy activity,” he explained.

DiBelardino knows that from personal experience. His first commercial venture — the X-It Ladder — a compact fire escape ladder for the home was copied by Kidde, the biggest fire extinguisher maker in the United States. After DeBelardino refused to sell the company his idea, it produced a knockoff that ate into his market share. In 2002, DiBelardino sued Kidde for patent infringement and won a $17 million settlement, the bulk of which went to attorneys fees, and had to give up the exclusive rights to his invention.

Read the full Story here

Furniture That Looks Like Aviator Sunglasses

For the last 2 years, I have lusted over Samal Design incredible furniture and designs. I first ran across him over a year ago when we did a blog on a Susan Boyle Makeover in which we put her in one of his eyewear designs. He also developed the 6dpi Eyewear otherwise known as pixeled eyewear. (We did an article on that as well)

Eyewear Library Desk By Samal Design

My latest discovery of Samal is his Aviator Desk or as he calls it a Library. How cool is this- wouldn’t this be a great dispensing table? Talk about interesting Retail strategies- have every piece of furniture you own made in the shape of eyewear and or accessories!

If any of our readers are into modern, fun and whimsical design check Samal Designs

Eyewear Eyeglass Locator

Another invention, never lose your eyeglasses with the eyewear eyeglass locator. Just put this little gadget on the temples and never lose your glasses again hmmmn, not too sure about anyone wanting this gadget on their eyeglasses though! Thank you to Zeiss+Sola+AO for being good sports and sponsoring Opti-fun today.

Say No To Norman Rockwell and Yes to Eye Rocks

Eye Wood From Birch

The number one painting I see in an optometrist office is that Norman Rockwell picture of the kid at the optometrist, occasionally there is a display of vintage eyewear and other miscellaneous optical supplies and then there is the picture someone gave that has a cartoon character with a doc or optician. But I say if you want to put the eyeball in your office do it with these unusual EyeRocks or EyeWood sculptures. Now I don’t know who Eye Rocks is, there is little information on the site, why do people do that?? Anyway the site offers Eyes from wood, eyes from rocks, eye paintings (some which are pretty cool and much better than Norman Rockwell) and even eye jewelry. Pretty cool stuff actually- So I say get rid of Norman and Go Eye Rocks

No matter what- summer is a good time to consider a remodel and or an eyewear re-merchandising plan- if you are looking to upgrade your office (we love Fashion Optical Displays) whether by new optical furnishing or make a new look, take a peek at Eye Rocks to add some eyeballs into your eye decor!

Eyewear Designers Take Heart-You Can Get A Job

Norm Edwards- Patrick Cox and Storm Collections of Eyewear

Aspiring eyewear designers take heart- Norm Edwards designer of such products as shoes, packaging and and automobiles created the eyewear for Patrick Cox and Storm eyewear collection- with Blue Gem being the licensed distributor for 5 years.

I discovered Norm Edwards on Coroflot, never realizing there has been some good articles about his design work, especially in opticianonline. and he already had a job with Blue Gem.

The Patrick Cox and Storm collection were launched at Mido 2009.

Braille Ball For All To Learn To Read Braille

In 1960, 50% of legally blind, school-age children were able to read Braille in the U.S. According to the 2007 Annual Report from the American Printing House for the Blind, there are approximately 57,696 legally blind children in the U.S. Out of those school-age children, only 10% use Braille as their primary reading medium. (Wikipedia)

The Braille system was based on a method of communication originally developed by Charles Barbier in response to Napoleon‘s demand for a code that soldiers could use to communicate silently and without light at night called night writing. Barbier’s system was too complex for soldiers to learn, and was rejected by the military. In 1821 he visited the National Institute for the Blind in Paris, France, where he met Louis Braille. Braille identified the major failing of the code, which was that the human finger could not encompass the whole symbol without moving, and so could not move rapidly from one symbol to another. His modification was to use a 6 dot cell — the Braille system — which revolutionized written communication for the blind.

Design group DESIGN 21 recently had a Game Changers Competition for global game design. You know who won this contest? Danielle Pecora. The project Pecora entered and won this contest with was the “be-B: Braille Education Ball,” a method for both blind and sighted users to learn the Braille system using a challenging and educational game.

The be-B consists of a ball and 26 magnetically attached pegs. One one side of each peg is a letter from the modern latin alphabet, on the other is the corresponding Braille character. Each of these pegs has a matching hole in the ball. The object of the game, as you may have guessed, is to match up each of the letters with its corresponding hole. Each time a peg is placed in a hole, and that hole is correct, a chime sounds and the name of the letter is “spoken.”

Source Yanko Design

Hoya Wins Prestigous IF Material Award For AR Coating

Hi-Vision LongLife wins iF material award Hoya confirms its leading position in the premium AR coating segment once more

Hoya’s new AR coating Hi-Vision LongLife only consists of high quality, long lasting materials.

Hoya iF Material Award 2010

It offers the highest scratch resistance on today‘s coating market*, is super anti-reflective, extremely water- and dirt repellent, and anti- static. Its unique properties ensure a durable and reliable performance year after year, and is therefore truely worthy of its name. Its outstanding quality also convinced the acknowledged iF International Forum Design Jury who announced Hi-Vision LongLife one of the laureates of the iF material award 2010.

This was not the first time a Hoya coating was unanimously rewarded by the jury. Four years ago Hoya’s Super Hi-Vision coating was also honored the important iF material award. Therefore, this award not only underlines the extraordinary properties of the new coating material, it also endorses Hoya once more as the leading company in premium coatings. In the development of its coatings Hoya takes the entire composition as its starting point and carefully synchronizes the materials and various layers of the coating. This ensures a maximum lens transparency and maximum toughness. To emphasize its confidence in the durability of this new anti-reflection coating, Hoya offers a three-year warranty on manufacturing defects, offering the optician even more arguments to convince his customers about the outstanding properties of this AR coating.

“In material technology it’s not about making something new, but about making something better. Important is to find the right balance between design and material“, according to the Jurors.

Ollendorf Mess-Systeme wins iF product design award

Hoya cooperates with some highly esteemed partners in the field and is proud to announce that Ollendorf Mess-Systeme was rewarded

Hoya iF Design Award 2010

the prestegious iF design award in the category “Medicine / Health Care” for their new video centering system visuReal® SMART.

This system scores with minimalistic design and easy handling with focus on the most important features. The software automatically records the measurement image. Face detection, camera control, recorder, photo lamp, and photo flash operate automatically so the main focus remains on the customer. There are two visuReal® SMART versions in different sizes, for placement on either a table or counter.

The iF material award

The iF material award was first handed out in 2005 and has since then been an important trend barometer within material technology. The iF logo, awarded by international experts, is trusted the world over and denotes proven material quality. This year, around 90 submissions from 66 participants in 18 countries entered the competition.

The iF design award

Since the introduction in the year 1953, the iF design award has been a reliable indicator of outstanding quality in design. The iF logo, awarded by international experts, is trusted the world over and denotes proven design quality. This year, 2.486 products from 39 different countries entered the competition. Information is also available on www.ifdesign.de in the iF online exhibition.