There are many ways to collect evidence of paranormal activity, some obviously better than others. Some have more of a "Proof" factor while others have a more emotional factor.

As an investigator you want to use all your senses. Your experiences will help add validity to any recordable evidence that you may collect. Unfortunately a visual sighting of a full body apparition won't hold any water to prove anything without the recorded data. It only becomes a great ghost story. So, make sure you are recording as much as you can.
  
Tools such as EMF (Electomagnetic Field) Detectors are helpful to determine changes in the environment. Again, this does no conclude that a ghost is present. However, if you can cause the EMF to change based on questions you ask to your contact on the other side, then you now have something with more meat to bite into. Make sure you ask the same questions in a different order to ensure you get the same answers. Techniques such as once-for-yes and twice-for-no can be very effective as long as you ask both yes and no questions. Avoid a common rhythm to your questions to ensure your answers are truly answers. This same technique can be used when asking for a ghost to make a noise.

The camera is one of the best pieces of equipment to bring. Now with digital cameras you can snap all night long and not have to worry about the cost of developing that film. However, digital pictures are extremely easy to modify now-a-days. Also, many file formats actually degrade every time you save-as a new file. So, keep the raw pictures separated from copies you send to your friends.

Later we will be discussing Thermo Imaging camera as well as several other techniques.