Crime Scene Preparations: Forensic Magazine has a good article describing the proper way to handle a crime scene. The best way for a successful chain of evidence starts by doing your homework. In this case, by stocking up!
“Also remember that working a crime scene should be a team effort for you and your department. One of the best things you can do is train the field officers and the first responders about your capabilities. These officers are your eyes in the field; it’s their job to call you when they see something that you can process. But if they don’t understand what you can do, they can overlook evidence.”
The article mentions that “some items may require superglue fuming, ninhydrin, DFO, or other specialized processing. Carefully collect these items, and then place them in an appropriate package to be sent to the lab.”
Superglue is warmed to produce fumes that react with the invisible fingerprint residues and atmospheric moisture to form a white polymer (polycyanoacrylate) on the fingerprint ridges. The ridges can then be recorded. The developed fingerprints are, on most surfaces (except on white plastic or similar), visible to the naked eye. Non-visible or poorly visible prints can be furthermore enhanced by applying a luminescent or non-luminescent stain.
Ninhydrin is commonly used in the analysis of latent fingerprints on porous surfaces such as paper. Amino acid containing finger marks, formed by minute sweat secretions which gather on the finger’s unique ridges, are treated with the ninhydrin solution which turns the amino acid finger ridge patterns purple and therefore visible.
DFO, or 1,8-Diazafluoren-9-one, is a chemical that is used to find fingerprints on porous surfaces. It makes fingerprints glow when they are lit by blue-green light.