Drawing is an activity we perform almost involuntarily as children and while reading, playing instruments, filming and taking photos are passively substituted to computer-based activities, drawing seems to be the next to become so. Children today have their first mouse click and scroll experiences before holding crayons in their hands. Indeed, they must get accustomed to this new age of technology, but still, are we that proud to teach them how to draw on the computer?

Not arguing too much about this, the software companies continue to create sophisticated products that allow us to develop creativity and imagination. A funny little yellow crayon has got my attention these days so I stopped to see what it was all about. Drawing and coloring software for kids always features friendly GUIs and accessible functions so I expected some colorful worksheets and buttons. To my surprise, Sketch Studio's interface looks almost as rigid and pale as the common Windows Paint. The first thing that came to my mind was 'Why should I pay $25 in order to use this software?'. No additional toolbars (even fewer instruments than Paint), no menus and no enabled functions!

Even before starting to explore the software I had to face these quite unfriendly messages for a curious first time user: 'No printing as a trial user', 'You cannot save as a Trial user', 'You cannot even open files as a Trial user' so I found myself looking at Paint's little red brushes and then at Sketch Studio's yellow crayon. What is it that makes you so special? (You may see a comparison between these applications in the first screenshot from the list of images below)

Well, the program has a catchy way of getting under your skin. The three crayons and the three smudge brushes are sitting aligned and occupy almost half of the main toolbar. In fact, they really are the main instruments there ('Sketch' and 'Smudge' - as the producers like to call them). When holding the mouse over them they start to smile and what is quite surprising is that when selecting one of them and moving over the worksheet the mouse cursor changes and simulates the holding of a crayon. So they try to convince the user that they're not drawing with the mouse, but with a virtual crayon. Let's say we accept this for some points.

A feature that I found very handful is the canvas resizing. All you have to do is select the Size/Move button and adjust the canvas dimensions as you wish. I think this idea should be applied to greater products that deal with image creation and editing, as this is the most inflexible image handling feature for most of the products. Usually you have to set the dimension when you start working and resizing afterwards may alter the contents, but with Sketch Studio you can resize the canvas as many times as you want without affecting the content. That's something the producers should be aware of!

In what concerns the 'lessons' that Sketch Studio provides for the application, they only teach you how to draw some elements like a Clownfish, a Jellyfish, Swallow, Monstertruck, Spongey and other childlike characters, but what is important about them is the teaching process. You will have to wait until 'Sketch' draws with a certain color and brush and only after that you will be requested to draw that again using the same colors.

I must admit that my first reticent impression changed a little, but this doesn't mean that simply because of some interactive features my opinions about mouse and crayon drawing can be altered. Of course, it's encouraging to develop such non-traditional artistical skills and children should really do so, but what's important to remember is that a mouse's main function is to move and perform clicks. Yet many may debate this, it's necessary to maintain valuable standards.

The Good
A nice part that caught my attention was the replaying feature. After finishing your drawing you can simply press the 'play' button and you will be able to watch the entire drawing process all over again. The animations really make a plus for this software and mostly the blinky eyes of Sketch would definitely make the children proud of their work.

The Bad
I haven't found any eraser that could eliminate unwanted parts of the drawing. Either you use the Undo command that steps back your recent actions, nor you erase the entire sketch, but eraser is a needed tool. As for other inconvenients, I'm not going to repeat the pricing issue here as I have mentioned this earlier.

The Truth
After letting Sketch Studio teach me how to draw a Jellyfish I could almost say that the product has its point for asking so much money, but at least some features could be improved. I'd suggest a smoother drawing line with an anti-alias mode because many times you lose the appetite for drawing just because of that undesired shaking that occurs when drawing with the mouse.

The truth is that I enjoyed experiencing some basic drawing lessons but still, this can be done at lower prices or even for free.