Sure, and there are plenty of free options out there for you. Just go dig around a bit. If you dont want to spend money, then you have to spend some time searching for them. No one was nice enough to organize every free stars mod for you.
There is one big thread though, with quite a few.
In terms of the cost of some of these mod, you obviously dont understand how much time goes into creating them (especially the more expensive ones). Then you also have the time spent coding the installers, hosting costs, and customer service. Trust me, no one is gettin rich from graphics mods. Even at the prices we charge it can take 6 - 10 months (or longer) to sell enough copies to ever make enough $ to cover the time investment.