We made a sled that any phone can rest on, with small cameras focused on the screen, keyboard (or just bottom half of the device), and ... where the participant's face is if she is holding the sled looking at the phone.

This is a little awkward, but not much. Even the cables are manageable; many participants put the phone down; others pick it up and interact with it.

We then use a wide-shot camera to get full body language (or even full room; it depends).

The four get mixed with a quad security camera mixing platform, captured into a portable device. We can get this whole thing, sans wide shot room camera, actually moving for things like mall intercepts.

The worst part of this system is the quad processor (four camera feeds recorded into one without having to work at it) isn't accessible any more. The existing products do a lot more, none of which we need, for a lot more.

Possibly useful resources:

• Mobile Usability Testing on a Budget at Design For Mobile
• All the posts tagged usability testing at Little Springs Design
• My presentation on mobile usability testing at Slideshare

At UPA I saw a presentation with a camera mounted on a fancy lamp-like device that was pointed down at the handheld device and its user. Morae video from above.

The device was pricey, but you could rig your own with one of these and some white or black duct tape.

Remember, with the current version of Morae, you can capture video from two cameras, so one looking at the device from above to see their hands on the device, and another pointed at the user's face to record their expressions.

One potential option is to install a VNC server on your mobile device. This will allow you to share the desktop of the mobile device with your PC, assuming it is network connected and you have the ability to install third party applications. A VNC client is then installed on your PC and you can use Morae to record the VNC client window. You will not get all of the search capabilities of Morae because these are not native MS Windows windows that are being displayed, but you will have the ability to flag events and create highlights videos.

For iPhone, you can use a combination of iSimulate and a screen capture recorder on the Mac.

iSimulate is a tool that lets you use the phone as a visual control for an app running on the simulator on your development machine. I use it for demoing apps to an audience, but this would also be a good tool for recording a user's behavior. It would be a lot cheaper and easier to set up than a camera.