PolarFinder Pro

Raffaele Lunari

About this app

This application allows you to make a precise stationing of the mount, excellent especially for astrophotographers and it works in both celestial poles.
In the settings you can choose to exclude the GPS and enter the customized coordinates and / or even a particular date and time in order to know the exact position of the Polaris (northern hemisphere) or Sigma Octantis (southern hemisphere) for a certain place.
This feature is also useful to know the peak of the polar for a specific place directly in the field without having to resort to third applications.
Once the position has been calculated, the polar image will be shown exactly as it should be set in the polar telescope, remembering that it inverts the images (the app also allows real vision).

ATTENTION: To use this app you need to see the Polar star and have a polar scope.

Main features of the app:

1. Possibility to manually enter coordinates,
date and time excluding
the gps;
2. Various reticles available:
- PolarFinder;
- Skywatcher (old and new);
- Ioptron;
- Bresser;
- Astro-Physics;
- Takahashi;
3. Works in both hemispheres;
4. Possibility of activating/deactivating the
view through the polar telescope (inverts
the images);
5. Possibility of activating/deactivating the "Full Screen" view;
6. Possibility of activating/deactivating the "Super Dark" view;
7. Position of the Polaris or of the Octant very
accurate thanks to the
calculation of the phenomenon of the
Precession;
8. Altimeter;
9. Very accurate help

PLEASE NOTE:
This app unlike most apps of its kind, takes into account the phenomenon of the Earth's Precession.
The Earth has a rather complex movement, one of them is called the Precession where the rotational axis of Earths slowly changes its orientation and the celestial poles are slowly changing with it. This movement is rather small, around 26,000 years per revolution, but in time it changes the apparent position of celestial objects. As the right-ascension coordinate is used when calculating the hour angle, it is important to consider the effects of precession on the RA coordinate.
For any problems, clarifications, suggestions or suggestions for improvement, write to me. I am at your complete disposal thanks and ...
Clear Skies!

Ratings and reviews

Great app for what it does. The bright white loading screen when it starts up is poorly thought out and should be dark. Response to developer: I have already set the "super dark mode" in the settings. The issue is when the app first starts up it momentarily flashes a bright white screen with a red telescope in the middle. It resembles the app icon.

I'm just learning, but the app is providing information asked for by my tracking mounts for current location. It's presented in a night view format, to keep visual distractions to a minimum. And it works on my tracfone android without any problems. I opted for the ad free version, because of data limits for my scenario. Very happy with the app this far.

I do astrophotography so getting a polar alignment is important. This app works well and is quite accurate. I have had no problems running it on my Moto Droid phone at all. EDIT: Had a weird thing happen (11/6/23) While showing the different reticle patterns to my wife, it got stuck on one of them and refused to change to any other. I simply uninstalled the app, reinstalled it and it works fine. I've never had any other problems with this app.

What's new

Small improvements