Snapchat's Spectacles will let you record your life, 10 seconds at a time

If Google Glass isn’t quite your thing, you might find Snapchat’s new camera-equipped glasses a bit more fun to wear, once they hit the shelves this fall for $130.

CEO Evan Spiegel just took the wraps off Spectacles, the first wearable from Snapchat and the company’s first foray into hardware since its founding five years ago. The product, which looks a lot like a pair of regular sunglasses, first showed up in a video leaked by Business Insider, and Snapchat was quick to confirm that the rumor was real.

Spectacles is designed to record 10-second videos captured with a fish-eye lens. Just tap a button near the glasses’ hinge and you can start recording videos in a circular format that is supposed to simulate a human’s field of view.

More specifically, Spectacles captures videos in a 115-degree field of view, setting it apart from typical mobile cameras and action cams already out in the market. You can sync the glasses with your mobile device to quickly share your “memories,” preferably over Snapchat, of course.

Right now, Spectacles is more of a “toy,” Evan Spiegel told the WSJ. The device will roll out to the market gradually, so Snapchat can gauge market reception before taking the plunge. 

Because Snapchat is more than just a messaging application now, the company also announced it would adopt a new name, Snap Inc.

It will be interesting to see how Spectacles fare in the market. Can Snapchat succeed where Google failed? Privacy concerns and the perceived “nerdiness” of Glass (and of Glass wearers) forced Google to go back to the drawing board. Glass was pulled from the consumer market, though Google is still working with companies interested in adopting Glass for productivity uses.

Available in black, teal or orange, Spectacles look fun and friendly – in other words, the opposite of Glass. It may be tempting to dismiss the idea as gimmicky, but Evan Spiegel already built a mult-billion-dollar business on top of what considered a gimmick – ephemeral messages.

What do you think about Spectacles?