The Scottish artist William Simpson was commissioned by Colnaghi & Co. to go to the Crimea to document the war. Simpson made numerous sketches which he turned into watercolours. Forty of these were published as coloured lithographs in two volumes titled Seat of the War in the East (1855–6). Both the watercolours and the lithographs were exhibited in Britain in 1856. Whilst lithographs lacked the ‘truthfulness’ and immediacy of photography, they could show actions which photography was technically unable to capture. The pictures also had the advantage of being in colour.