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Appreciation post: I picked a $40 tripod over a $200 tracker for my star shots, and the cheap one won
Two summers back I got into shooting the Milky Way from my parents' backyard outside Tucson. I had $250 saved and two ways to spend it: a motorized star tracker for long exposures, or a plain sturdy tripod plus gas money to drive out past the city lights. I went with the tripod and started stacking 20 second shots instead. After about 8 nights of practice, my stacked shots looked cleaner than my buddy's single tracked ones, mostly because I had way more sky to work with at a darker site. The tracker would've just let me shoot longer from my light polluted street. Curious if anyone here gave up on tracking gear once they found a dark enough spot?
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cole_murphy6h ago
My first attempt at Milky Way shots was so bad the stars looked like little dashes from me bumping the tripod every 10 seconds. Thought I needed a tracker too until I just drove 40 minutes east of Phoenix and suddenly 15 second shots looked better than anything I got at home. Still can't get my head around polar alignment, so the tracker would probably just sit in a closet judging me. Dark skies beat gear every time in my book.
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