Right out of the box, it’s easy to appreciate the looks of the SheaDog glasses. They sport an industrial design that looks much more adult than a lot of other headsets I see on the market. They look professional, not really sporty.
I’m going to take a moment to talk about the comfort of wearing these, ignoring the lenses which I’ll discuss below. This section will just deal with the weight and how it feels on my ears/nose. I don’t normally wear glasses, I have better than 20/20. But in comparison I have some sunshades (Native Eyewear Attacks and some cheap Oakleys). The SheaDogs felt lighter than both of them, and also had a padded nose piece (if I review any more glasses I’m going to have to learn the proper terminology). It looks like the padded material is made out of gel. If I close my eyes, it’s easy to imagine I’m not wearing glasses at all. The part of the frame that goes around your ear has rubber around it, covering the metal frame that’s underneath.
However, once you open your eyes, you’re going to notice what these glasses were meant for. Almost immediately, my eyes feel cooler upon putting them on. I’m not exactly sure why that is, but it worked. Then when I look at my TV screen, some differences became readily apparent.
The amber tint of my lenses (I got Onyx black frames with Amber yellow lenses) cast a yellowish light on the screen. It’s noticeable. I didn’t particularly like the color change. After about 20 to 30 mintues of use, it seems like your eyes adjust to the color and it becomes less noticable. That makes the transition really hard to looking at a screen without the glasses on. It must be noted though that they do offer a “crystalline” lens that appears to not shift the colors.
However, some good things must be said about this color change. It shifts everything to a warmer hue, making it much easier on my eyes. I spent several weeks using these, and I’m often at a computer. The difference between the days I wore these and the days I didn’t were apparent. On the nights when I didn’t wear them, my eyes would be tired, they’d feel dry and I’d have a harder time keeping them open. That wasn’t the case at all on the nights I wore SheaDogs. I had no trouble keeping them open.
The SheaDogs also magnify what you’re looking at. I’m not quite sure how I would describe how much it magnifies by. They’re definitely mini binoculars, but the difference is still noticable. Text was much easier to read. In fact, I used the SheaDogs a lot with my iPad before I go to bed, and reading was much easier while wearing the glasses.
The benefit to gaming should already be apparent to you by now. Magnified view combined with less fatigue in your eyes is a huge boon when gaming. Especially for competitive gaming, where scrimmages could last hours, I’m starting to hold the opinion that having some glasses like these is vital when it comes to getting your top performance. And not only do they perform well, but I feel like they’d be stylish at a Major League Gaming event.
I’m an IT Intern at a small to medium sized defense contractor. I also operate my website and spend a lot of time answering emails and forums and messages, not to mention doing homework. So I spent a huge portion of the day in front of computer screens. Making it through the day becomes a lot more bearable with these on. I do reccomend that if you’re in the digital graphics industry where color calibration is important, you look into the crystalline lens because that should result in a true color reproduction. But for the rest of us, the benefits of the amber lenses are huge.
The SheaDogs didn’t feel flimsy at all. They do have a light metal construction, but it didn’t seem fragile. As with all my reviews, I can’t stress enough to take care of your stuff. They came in a cardbox box that you could use to store them when not wearing them. I do reccomend you go with something a little more stylish for your own sake, get a nice case. The SheaDogs aren’t exactly cheap. Also of note, they come with a soft pouch for storing them in that seems to come standard with most sunshades these days. It’s useful for keeping dust off of it and using to wipe fingerprints and other smudges off the lenses.
At $70 from Amazon, the Gunnar Optiks SheaDog are no impluse purchase. But they’ve become alost indispensable to me. I haven’t used any other gaming glasses, but I can safely say that I feel the SheaDogs were worth the money and I highly reccomend them to you if you spend a lot of time in front of the screen. In truth, that should apply to most of my readers. But if you don’t spend more than an hour or two a day in front of a screen, then these may not be necessary.
