Funiot’s Chemion Bluetooth LED glasses turn a third of your face into an animated LED display, all for the low, low price of half your vision and probably at least a little dignity.
The Chemion glasses connect to an app on your smartphone via Bluetooth that lets you create your own animations and graphics, then upload them to the glasses.
The App is fairly simple to use and you’re only limited by your own low-resolution creativity — and some patience. The Chemion App enables you to draw and erase with your fingertip, and it supports some basic functions such as copying, pasting, and shifting the display up, down, left, or right. These features make it easier to create the individual frames for your own custom animations, which you can save to your phone.
The App works reasonably well but is still a bit awkward to use, particularly if you have a small phone screen. (I use a Google Nexus 6P with a 5.5″ screen and was able to use the Chemion App with minimal frustration.)
The Chemion glasses run on two AAA batteries, one stored in each of the temple tips. The glasses are large and bulky, but at least come with an adjustable rubber strap to prevent them from taking a nose dive off of your face. A simple drawstring carry pouch and 2 AAA batteries are also included.
As long as you don’t want o move around too much through dark or complex environments — I suspect attempting Parkour in Chemions would be as hilariously dangerous as it would be potentially cool– the Funiot Chemion glasses definitely have the ‘cool’ and ‘wow’ factor in their favor.
Overall: Ridiculous but fun
I can’t really give a score to the glasses, but I can say they are a pretty cool novelty item. My kids (10 and 13) instantly loved them, and as long as you think you’ll get plenty of use out of them, the $69 price tag seems reasonable.
I’d love to see a fully RGB/color version of the glasses, perhaps with a higher resolution display.
PC & Video Gaming Examiner 