Sorry for the late response... I did not see this before Anthony M responded. What has been your problem with the ball head? What difficulties would you like to overcome?
I agree with this statement. I started out with a cheap ball head... I would meticulously get everything set up, and then tighten the ball only to have the framing move while I tightened it. Then I would loosen to re-adjust, but it was to sticky to get it right. Very frustrating. A new ball head fixed my problems.
Another thing that can help with some tripods is to reverse the column and hang you camera under the tripod. You can get real close to the ground without splaying the legs out which makes them very springy. This helps even more for cheaper or light weight tripods.