I work at Chainguard, hoping this helps answer your question. Chainguard has free and paid images. You can find all the free images in the Chainguard Images Directory: https://images.chainguard.dev/directory?category=all
I was expecting an answer to my question to then build myself an answer to his original question. I was trying to showcase what Chianguard Images are in a nutshell. But you are right: overly complicated.
What images do you usually use and where do you pull them from? ;-)