If/when Apple introduces its own version of VR smartglasses, these “Apple Glasses” may have bendable lens as evidenced by a newly granted patent (US 12222501 B1)
About the patent
Apple is supposedly working on smartglasses that would have a design more akin to regular eyeglasses than the Vision Pro. The newly granted patent is for a pair of glasses having a frame that supports transparent lenses in front of a user’s face. A pair of hinges couples left and right temples to left and right sides of the frame.
The display systems may have projectors, waveguides, and optical couplers for directing left and right images to left and right eye lenses, respectively. The frame may have a nose bridge portion that bends under pressure from a user’s head while the glasses are being worn by the user.
Spring hinges or other structures may be used to supply a constant bending force from the temples to the frame over a range of head sizes. When the nose bridge is in an unbent configuration, the images from the display systems are misaligned with respect to the eye boxes. When the glasses are being worn and the frame is being bent, the images are aligned with respect to the eye boxes.
Summary of the patent
Here’s Apple’s abstract of the patent: “A head-mounted device may have a head-mounted support structure. The head-mounted support may support optical systems. The optical systems may be display systems that provide images to eye boxes. A user may view images from the display systems when the user’s eyes are located in the eye boxes.
“The head-mounted support structure is bent due to pressure from a user’s head while the head-mounted support structure is being worn by the user. Spring hinges or other structures may be used to supply a constant bending force to the head-mounted support structure over a range of head sizes. When the head-mounted support structure is in an unbent configuration, the images will be misaligned with respect to the eye boxes and each other. When the head-mounted support structure is being worn and the head-mounted support structure is being bent, the images will be aligned satisfactorily.”
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