Gadgets will offer short window of opportunity

Augmented reality glasses and contact lenses were a hot topic during Optrafair last month.

While the excitement generated by new smart devices, demonstrated most recently by the Apple watch, is undeniable, their actual use is often less cut and dried.

The real advantage smart glasses have over the wrist-residing alternative is hands free display, video and photography.Indeed, the idea of using your entire field of vision to watch a film could be a major selling point, while the uses for journalists include shooting live footage on the move, which can be relayed straight back to the news desk.

For an optometrists, meanwhile, the use of Google Glass for eye examinations while accessing images and records has been explored, but the cost of current prototypes is clearly quite prohibitive.