so what's the difference between cheap versus expensive sunglasses in this video I'm going to show you how to choose the best sunglasses by reviewing the different type of lens options that are out there different lens coatings and tints as well as other cool technology that you probably just didn't know existed in finding the best pair of sunglasses let's take a look hey what's up everybody this is dr. Allen here from the doctor eye health show helping you learn about the eyes vision and finding the best vision products and I'm really excited today as if you
have been following the channel this is about the exact two year anniversary from when this channel first started and if you go back and check out that first video is all about sharing tips on finding sunglasses so things have finally come about full circle and I'm really excited because I got to team up with one of my favorite sunglasses brands out there that I think personally is this one of the highest quality brands you can find so a big THANK YOU to Randolph engineering for making this video possible sending me out a few lenses so
I can show them to you guys and show you what high quality sunglasses are all about but even though this video is featuring Randolph sunglasses keep in mind all of these tips can be used and applied for finding any good brand of sunglasses now being a huge fan and collector of sunglasses myself and I have a pretty embarrassingly large collection of sunglasses there's a couple of things that I always look for in trying to find a really good pair and yes they're gonna be more expensive but the money was well spent now the first thing
of course you need to pick out the frame style and design whatever it's gonna fit for you I know a lot of people will say that you have to match it to your face shape that is not necessarily true when it comes to sunglasses it really is about the style the vibe and the attitude you want to portray and really as long as they're not too tiny for your face then they're probably gonna still be able to pull them off just as a tip for you if you are not sure what size you need to
pick if you can't get to an optical to try them out and you do have maybe a pair of sunglasses yourself or maybe somebody in your family or a friend does you can go ahead and put them on and if they fit well look on the side on the inside of the temple you may be able to see some numbers there if you can match those numbers up to something similar that you can purchase then likely they're gonna fit just fine and the cool thing about Randolph is that they do have different frame sizes available
plus you can even add different lens finishes I personally like the cobalt finish the best that one's my favorite now the next big thing for picking out the best pair of sunglasses really has to do with the lenses and I know if you're not in the optical industry you probably don't know that there are different types of lens materials not just for standard eyeglasses but for sunglasses as well if you go to the store just like a gas station you pick up a cheap really cheap pair of sunglasses the lenses are not gonna have very
good quality and you can probably tell that pretty easily these lenses are usually made of what's called poly carbonate this is one of the cheapest lens materials that's out there it does have the advantage of being a safety lens material however the optical quality through the lens is very poor it also has a very low Abbe value I've never heard of that in the optical industry every lens material has an Abbe value that describes how much aberrations that you'll experience especially with colors so a lens material such as Crown glass which we're gonna get into
has a highest Abbe value can have which means very low colour distortion giving you crisp clear images with natural viewing of colors and again cheap lenses made of polycarbonate have the lowest Abbe value can get and you just don't see things as sharply in addition polycarbonate lenses are notorious for being very easy to scratch now as long as you do your homework and you research really good brands of sunglasses you'll find that most offer some type of mineral crown glass lenses now at Randolph they offer crown glass lenses of pretty much for any type of
frame that they offer what is really cool about crown glass is that it gives you the best optical quality you can get yes i glasses used to be made of this now they're pretty hard to find because it is a little bit more expensive and it's a little bit heavy however it gives the best optical clarity and if you have never experienced it I strongly suggest you try it because I know myself and other people in the optical business you try pair of plastic lenses polycarbonate even CR39 and then you go into something like glass
you can just tell that images pop out and look so much sharper I mean consider the lenses in your camera including the camera I'm using right now to shoot this video the lenses are not made of plastic they're made of glass the same glass that's used in these types of sunglasses and another additional benefit is that glass lenses are very scratch resistant not even to include the fact that they can add anti scratch coating but because mineral glass is a hard type of material it's harder to scratch so if you just happen to be somebody
who has the tendency to scratch things then definitely consider glass lenses but what if you're not into glass lenses that's okay there are other lens materials beyond polycarbonate that I think work better and one of those materials are called nylon lenses they have a higher aberration value or a B value that means it's very similar to glass you have get a better optical quality through those lenses and because they're nylon they are also more scratch resistant than a lot of the other plastics but one of the benefits of having a glass lens like nylon is
that it's much lighter than the glass lenses so if you're somebody who wears your sunglasses all day long and you just want that improved comfort of a lighter lens these lenses have about a 40% decrease in weight compared to glass lenses now once you've considered the lens material glass versus plastic now you want to consider the color of the lenses now I know most people probably will just fall into the category of getting the neutral gray color this is Randolph's American gray this is really the standard sunglasses lenses which work for most people and pretty
much any condition whether you're driving you're flying an airplane such as something with Randolph being that these are the standard-issue sunglasses used for the US military the Air Force the Navy as well as even used by different astronauts and space X and they were recently featured in their launch it's kind of cool to check that stuff out now these lenses are category three lenses that makes them the highest quality Sun lenses that you can get per European standards which I should say is way stricter than American standards and these lenses also made with something called
a luminous transmittivity which has to do with the amount of light coming through the lenses and it's set at 17.5% which is ideal for allowing the viewer to adapt to changes in color and brightness okay I'm sorry I know I'm just nerding out a lot but it's really cool stuff now other than the grey lenses you have pink and blue but you also have another color like green lenses now myself I've really loved green lenses even other competing brands have their own specialty green lenses these ones in particular though these are the Randolph AGX lenses
the green lens really kind of heightens your difference in yellow and green sit brightens those up and it helps sharpen contrast just a little bit and overall it's very soothing gives you just excellent vision through these lenses this particular pair also happens to be made of their glass lens and they're even polarized so it helps a lot with the contrast and reducing glare overall if you're thinking about getting a pair of green lenses they work in pretty much any situation I love it for when I'm driving or if I'm going outside for a walk I
think golfers often like to use green lenses because it lets you see the grass and the different kind of contours in the grass as well as just see the foliage and the green trees just a little bit better and it's just it's an overall very soothing lens now it's a third option for lenses if you're just not sure consider getting a brown or a tan tinted lens in that these often in heighten your contrast in your distance just a little bit and oftentimes people report that they see just a little bit sharper with a tan
or brown lens these again heighten some of the Browns the yellows and even some of the green tones in your vision and funny enough Randolph even calls this their Instagram filter because it kind of makes things overall seem a little bit brighter and almost happier now I'm not sure if you can see it here but these gradient lenses from Randolph what do they call their sky force air these also have a blue shimmer on the front which is what they call their Northern Lights lens so it has a brown on the top and that in
gradients down to clear but that blue shimmer on the front just gives kind of a cool look but I'll have to pass that on to you guys do you think this is a cool look do I pull it off yay night love to hear your feedback know the other cool features about this lens here which is kind of a cool option for you if you're somebody who also likes to drive a lot but also likes to be able to see the dashboard really clearly or if you're somebody who likes to sit out maybe like on
the beach and you also like to have a book or look at your phone at the same time this lens has a gradient tint to it that means it has more of your tint for the sunglasses at the top of the lens and then toward the bottom of the lens it's just clear it still offers UV light protection throughout the entire lens so even though it's clear at the bottom you're still getting sun protection which is really important especially for me as an eye doctor you want to be protecting your skin around the eyes and
the eye itself from that harsh UV light but with the tint again you get the nice contrast of decreasing all the incoming light from the top but you also get that clear image through the bottom so again if you're looking at a book your phone you can see it clearly now last few tips I want to share with you there's special technology additives that are put on two lenses that are very high quality versus the low cheap quality pairs that don't have these sort of benefits now the first thing I'm gonna mention is really big
deal to me when it comes to sunglasses and you've probably heard me mention it in other videos and that has to do with sunglasses having a backside anti-reflective coating cheap sunglasses like these you can see if I hold it up to the light you just get a complete reflection of the light I'm using to shoot this video but if you have a good pair of sunglasses they will have a backside anti-reflective coating so here on wrandell you can see these multicolored reflections that is that anti-reflective coating otherwise if you are just wearing the cheap pair
of sunglasses without that you're gonna see reflections of images of things that could be behind you certainly sunlight images of cars and other things like that you don't want those distracting images and it's unfortunate because a lot of good and even famous sunglasses brands out there they sometimes forget to put an anti-reflective coating on the back surface of their lenses and I'm just like what are they doing but in addition to just anti-reflective coatings companies like Randolph and other producers of high-quality lenses they not only have the anti reflective but they put in anti scratch
anti oil and anti water coatings on the surface of the lenses so that they're easier to clean they get dirty a lot less and so if you do get a finger smudge on there it rubs off a lot easier so hopefully after all of this you now know the difference between a cheap versus a very high-quality pair of sunglasses hey if you liked this video smash that like button for me and if you're interested in checking out Randolph sunglasses available oh so that it'll take you directly to their website and you can check out some
of the cool frames even the exact ones that I have in this video if you do have any other questions about sunglasses lens materials tints anything you want like to know go ahead and reach out to me in the comment section and I'd love to get back to you guys again thanks so much for watching keep an eye on it and we'll talk to you soon
