Ian Sidaway originally trained as a graphic designer and has been working as a freelance artist since 1970. He is the author of 20 art techniques books, including The Instant Artist, which won the Artist's Choice Art Instruction Book of the Year award in 2001.

Wendy Jelbert works in a wide variety of media, from watercolour and gouache to acrylics and oil. She is an accredited demonstrator for a number of international art supply manufacturers, including Caran d'Ache, Swan Stabilo and Winsor and Newton. An experienced teacher of painting at all levels, she runs regular courses from her home in Hampshire and is also a regular tutor at a number of leading residential UK art centres. Wendy Jelbert is a very experienced and popular artist and author. Having studied abstract art, pottery, sculpture and printmaking at Southampton College of Art, Wendy has gone on to work in pastels, oils, acrylics, inks and watercolours. She has written eight instruction books and a number of articles for the leisure art magazines.