Is it possible to get USABLE footage of a starlit sky with the A1? The moon I can get, but the surrounding clouds are non-existent black. I'm pretty sure that a framing of the moon will come out, but maybe that the light of stars are too weak to be filmed.

I haven't really tried but I would assume to be able to get remotely usable footage you could set the shutter to the longest possible shutter (1/3) (24p) and open up the aperture as much as possible depending on how far you have to zoom in... Then you could mess with the gain... But unfortunately that would introduce quite a good bit of noise....

You could just do what everyone else does and CG them in... lol... j/k...

when shooting a starry night sky with an slr camera, shutter speed is measured in seconds, not fraction of seconds. a shutter speed of 1/3 is still way too fast. additionally, it would be very tough for any video camera, including the current crop of hd cameras, to resolve all the tiny speckles that are stars in a nice wide shot of the nighttime sky. a good still camera would be your best bet.

when shooting a starry night sky with an slr camera, shutter speed is measured in seconds, not fraction of seconds. a shutter speed of 1/3 is still way too fast. additionally, it would be very tough for any video camera, including the current crop of hd cameras, to resolve all the tiny speckles that are stars in a nice wide shot of the nighttime sky. a good still camera would be your best bet.

Oh yeah... I agree the A1 would probably yield marginal results at best... As well as any other 'video' camera out there that I know of... Except an SLR, something maybe like a D80 or D200...

The Canon XH can do it as a still photo but not nearly as well with video.

See my images here:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=72218
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=68770

Those are from an XL H1 but could be done with an XH and a teleconverter.

Your best bet, if you need it for a shot, is to lock off your camera, film your night time scene, and then drop in some matte-painted or photographed stars in after effects. Check out Close Encounters of the Third Kind for how effective this can be.

Or, if you need time-lapse footage of moving stars use a DSLR and use a wide shutter, taking one picture every 30 seconds (maybe 3 second shutter)... looks great as a jpeg sequence.

i've seen movies in which the night sky and stars are very vivid and large, with actors shown doing things below the sky, in that same shot. One that comes to mind is a scene from Pearl Harbour, that shows the night sky with stars everywhere. how are they able to do this?

It can be done with a DSLR or a video camera.
The trick to keeping the shot from smearing while extending the shutter time, "remember the Earth is spinning", is to mount your camera to a telescope controller.
I use a Meade AutoStar setup with the telescope mount removed, and use a custom bracket to mount the camera. You can then program the unit to hold position while the Earth is turning.
Good Luck with your project!

I use my Nikons D200 or D300 to do this. With the Nikon D300 you can raise the ISO to 800 with no increasing noise. Take shots in a solid tripod, sequenced, every shot must be about 10-12 seconds, (for a 50mm f:1,8 lens), no more time or you will get star trails.
Import the images to your software to do "Stop motion".
Put the camera in a high place, outside the city, to avoid contamination.
And good luck.

I wonder if it would be possible shooting through a night vision monocular or similar - the one my brother has for fishing / hunting (and in his case finding poachers!) has a camera adapter ring - obviously this shoots in green instead of black, but could be shot in black & white.

There is an adapter that enables you to do this. Alana used to sell them - probably still do but I haven't checked their catalogue lately

Alana Ecology Wildlife, Nature Conservation and Field Equipment (http://www.alanaecology.co.uk)