At the age of 18 he entered the workshop of Cabanel, where he applied his skill to the decoration of china, and where he met Rudor, from whom he received instruction in lithography, in the practice of which he was to rise to fame.
He then entered the École des Beaux-Arts, but returned to lithography in 1830 when he produced on stone his famous designs of Lützen, Waterloo, Le bal, La revue, and Les adieux de la garrison, by which his reputation became immediately established.
[1] Raffet's chief works were his lithographs of the Napoleonic campaigns, from Egypt to Waterloo, vigorous designs inspired by ardent patriotic enthusiasm.
As an illustrator his activity was prodigious, the list of works illustrated by his crayon amounting to about forty-five, among which are Béranger's poems, the History of the Revolution by Adolphe Thiers, the History of Napoleon by de Norvins, the great Walter Scott by Auguste Defauconpret, the French Plutarch and Frédéric Bérat's Songs.
In 1893 a monument by Emmanuel Frémiet was unveiled in the Jardin de l'Infante at the Louvre, Paris.