IllumiShare: sharing any surface

Task and reference spaces are important communication channels for remote collaboration. However, all existing systems for sharing these spaces have an inherent weakness: they cannot share arbitrary physical and digital objects on arbitrary surfaces. We present IllumiShare, a new cost-effective, light-weight device that solves this issue. It both shares physical and digital objects on arbitrary surfaces and provides rich referential awareness. To evaluate IllumiShare, we studied pairs of children playing remotely. They used IllumiShare to share the task-reference space and Skype Video to share the person space. The study results show that IllumiShare shared the play space in a natural and seamless way. We also found that children preferred having both spaces compared to having only one. Moreover, we found that removing the task-reference space caused stronger negative disruptions to the play task and engagement level than removing the person space. Similarly, we found that adding the task-reference space resulted in stronger positive disruptions.