In the briefing, Hal demos his 3 favorite tech tools for measuring scenes, recording interviews, and seeing in the dark.
The tech I use most often as an investigator is Notetaker Pro and the Rev recorder/transcription app. With Rev, you can record an interview, then hit send, and it goes to get transcribed right away. When the interview begins, I just open Rev on my iPad, and press record, then I open Notetaker pro and take notes with the iPencil during the interview. That’s my favorite combination of tech.
1. iPad 11 Pro
My iPad 11 Pro has 1TB storage and is, overall, a magnificent machine. Mine has Evernote, Dropbox, all my field-sharing stuff. I can open and edit Word and PDF docs and even shoot video. It’s perfect for fieldwork.
Evernote is a necessary app if you’re working with attorneys. It lets you collect all the evidence on a case in one place, where you can easily organize, search, put it all into notebooks.
2. Leica Disto Measuring Tool
The Leica Disto measuring tool is insanely useful. If you have to measure distances on a crime scene, you can measure everything from one spot. It’s the same model police use to diagram crime scenes in 3D. It’s new to me, and I’m excited about it as a tool.
3. SiOnyx Night Vision Camera
Last but not least, we’ve been test-driving the SiOnyx Aurora night vision camera this month, and it’s incredible. SiOnyx is sponsoring us this month, which we agreed to do because they make a great product.
Check out our side-by-side demonstration in the video below, about 3 minutes in. It’s pretty astonishing. —Hal