For clarity, it is best practice here in the US for notes to be contemporaneous. In other words, you take notes as you perform an exam, aquisition, or investigation. Your project sounds very interesting.
One tool not mentioned is Microsoft Word, or en equivalent such as LibreOffice or OpenOffice. Word is very versatile, and allows for many helpful ways of formatting notes, embedding screen captures or other objects, allows for password protection, and can be saved to PDF. PDFs can be digitally signed by you or your organization which will then prevent alteration. For lab work, this works well. Out in the field, another option obviously becomes necessary. It will be interesting to see what works well aside from a good old fashioned pen/pencil and a notebook.
Best of luck with it!