Lanc Controller with Arduino...

Using Arduino Project Guidance
5

From your code I deduce that you are receiving a 16-bit word in the following bit order: 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8. Here is how to read all the bits into a 16-bit unsigned integer:

// Start Reading Byte 0 
    uint16_t recValLo = 0;
    pinMode(lancPin, INPUT);
    delayMicroseconds(bitDuration/2); 
    for (int i=0; i < 8; i++) {
      recValLo <<= 1;
      if (digitalRead(lancPin) == HIGH)
      {  
          recValLo |= 1;
      } 
      delayMicroseconds(bitDuration); 
    }

// Start Reading Byte 1
    uint16_t recValHi = 0;
    pinMode(lancPin, INPUT);
    delayMicroseconds(bitDuration/2); 
    for (int i=0; i < 8; i++) {
      recValHi <<= 1;
      if (digitalRead(lancPin) == HIGH)
      {  
          recValHi |= 1;
      } 
      delayMicroseconds(bitDuration); 
    }

    uint8_t recVal = (recValHi << 8) | recValLo;

The 2 loops are identical apart from the variables they use, so you should consider writing a function and calling it twice.