>>4488024Panoramic tripod heads are so you can shoot panoramas while keeping the nodal point the same
If you pan direction on a normal tripod, differences in nodal point can give you some distortion
It doesn't have much functional benefit outside of panoramas / composite
>>4488232You can get geared heads which offer precise angle adjustment as the knobs are "geared" rather than "locked/unlocked" like most heads, but they are generally quite expensive.
Any decent tripod will lock at whatever angle you want, and you can usually be fine with relying on the cameras built-in level.
