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Old 16-10-2021, 03:43   #1
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What's the best star tracker app for Android ?

I down loaded star Tracker but it's not as good as I hopped.

I'd like to see what the camera sees and target a star and have it accurately locate/identify. At the moment the boats anchor light 200 yards away is Vega or it picks up the correct star but in the wrong place.

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Old 16-10-2021, 06:02   #2
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Re: What's the best star tracker app for Android ?

Maybe this app is different, (I doubt it) but none of the ones I know of use the camera to look at the sky. They use the gps to calculate location, the compass to figure out direction, and the accelerometers to determine the orientation of the phone. Then they display a calculated star map based on the time and location.

If your phone’s compass is not calibrated they do not work well or at all, that’s the most common problem.
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Old 16-10-2021, 12:22   #3
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Re: What's the best star tracker app for Android ?

Agree with BillKny.


I use Sky Map and sometimes it can be a little "off". The solution (as the app itself will sometimes tell you) is to move and rotate the phone wildly in all directions for a couple seconds. But even after that, it's not perfect. However, since you can see a large portion of the sky in the app, it's usually not hard to figure out which star you are looking at.


AFAIK, there is currently no app that uses the camera to identify stars.
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Old 16-10-2021, 12:33   #4
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Re: What's the best star tracker app for Android ?

If you're looking for augmented reality (what the camera sees, with stars and planets overlaid on the display) then try Skyview Light (shows up as "Skyview free" on the icon.)
https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...11.skyviewfree

I've used it, and it's pretty good, but I find myself using one called Skymap more:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...roid.stardroid

If you're looking for satellites, Heaven's Above is probably even better.
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Old 17-10-2021, 08:53   #5
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Re: What's the best star tracker app for Android ?

While you can't point your device's camera at a star to identify it, I really like the features of Stellarium, a free app. Overlays of images of constellations and relatively easy to understand instructions. Great to sit on the foredeck and learn the major stars and the distance to them.
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Old 17-10-2021, 09:10   #6
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Re: What's the best star tracker app for Android ?

If you want to learn to spot stars, there is a great app called Sextant Stars made exactly for that purpose. I don't think it will show you what star you are actually currently looking at like the other apps. But it will help you to recognize them without an app.
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