Paid $90 for a "star tracker" app before I knew my camera could do it free

Back in 2019 I was just getting into shooting the night sky and I thought you needed some fancy paid app to stack and align your shots, so I dropped $90 on a yearly subscription. It did work, but then a guy at a local astronomy club meetup in Tucson showed me how to do the same stacking with free software and my camera's built in interval mode. I felt pretty dumb standing in that parking lot with my tripod, realizing I'd basically paid almost a hundred bucks to not read my own manual. I cancelled the sub but that money was gone. If you shoot stars, do you pay for anything or just use the free stuff?

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the_john4d ago

Plenty of people pay for apps like Sequator or Starry Landscape Stacker and swear by them, and a subscription often includes updates and support that free tools just don't. Your mileage may vary, but "free" sometimes costs you way more in time.

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