And, how dark will the area be?
The Dahua 2Megapixel "Starlight" cameras that use the Sony Starvis sensors are widely regarded as the best reasonably priced low-light IP cameras.
But you can also get thermal imaging cameras, and presumably image intensified type cameras as well. But now you're talking some serious money.
I got to take a helicopter ride where the local life-flight pilots were demonstrating the new gen 4 night vision goggles that they were able to buy with funding from a charitable organisation where my wife worked. Oddly, very few people turned out for the demo, so we both got to go for hour-long flights wearing the goggles.
To say they're amazing is an understatement. While flying, on a moonless night, far out of town, in "dark sky" areas of Wyoming, you were able to clearly see rabbits, deer, foxes, pronghorns, etc., as well as any features on the ground, and all from only the illumination provided by the stars.
Meteors were frequent, almost constant, and the gen 4 system compresses the dynamic range locally, within the image so well that when a car was in view on a road, its headlights did not affect the low-light view of even very nearby areas in the image. The dynamic compression was astoundingly effective.
If you have $10,000+ to spend on a camera, one of those type systems would be superb! I believe these goggles cost over $30,000 each, but they made it possible for the pilots to safely land, at night, near obstructions such as power lines and the like. So the charity felt the request was justified. It really is just amazing technology.
For around $120, one of the Dahua Starlight cameras with no sound and no PTZ would be pretty darned good, though.
How dim is the lighting in the area? I would imagine things are kept dark, and you are in a "dark sky" area so the telescopes are not hampered by light pollution from nearby civilization. Image intensifiers may be required if it is really dark.
