With fewer art programs in schools these days on average, the next generation of budding artists looks bright.

In elementary school, students take a piece of paper, place it on top of a personal tablet and trace an image using a technique that is similar to using an animation light box. Then after having the full black and white outline, they continue to color the traced image using colored pencils and crayons.

Last week, while at a middle school, I sat in a classroom during lunch to supervise an anime club meeting that was going on. They told me I had to play anime music on the radio, which I did, but I was also curious of the types of hobbies the students had in addition to anime. I looked around the room and students were drawing in sketch books with natural art skills that surpassed mine in 7th grade.

There was one student with a tablet and a stylus that cost $99 (I do not even own a stylus that expensive!). I asked her how she started drawing and she said her parents both taught her from a young age. Her dad was a fan of Sonic the Hedgehog and her mom knew how to draw art digitally. I asked what app program she used to draw and she said Ibis, it had all the layering functions and multiply functions.

During the club meeting, I heard a student say, “Who wants to read webcomics with me?” And a couple of students sat down at a table and began reading webcomics during lunch.

It is just interesting to see the next generation take on an interest in drawing comics and webcomics. It is quite fascinating, actually. It is like watching Saved By the Bell: The New Class if I were in the original Saved By the Bell cast.

Good on you, parents who are teaching their children how to geek out on webcomics and draw art with other like-minded students during lunch.

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