When I do panos, I rotate the copter 360° before I start the pano and expose for the brightest part of the sky in manual mode. After the image is stitched I brighten up the shadows for a balanced exposure.
You took the words right out of my mouth. I will add that the histogram is your best friend. While the EV indicator gives one a general sense of exposure, the histogram will allow you to make intelligent decisions when faced with a choice of either blowing out a sky or crushing the shadows. I always shoot in Log mode for 1 or 2 extra stops of dynamic range. Do these things and you should be able to even out exposure in post.
In a related story, I do construction progress videos, which are essentially a 360° POI (albeit, a bit more sophisticated). I have always struggled with exposure but I have learned that it's best to set the exposure at the high end of safe. Why? Because the client probably cares a lot more about what lurks in the shadows than blowing out the sky. These are not beauty videos. They are forensic videos. That said, even with my "high end" exposure, I find the EV values on the Inspire 1 X3 camera tend to be "hotter" than actual EV. So I generally shoot -1.7 to 0.0. If any part of the shot gets into positive EV numbers, that's pretty much a guarantee that I've blown something out.
Here's a screen capture from yesterday's shoot. The is the "darker" side of the shoot because the sun is in front of me.
As you can see, there's plenty of exposure in the shadows with some parts of the photo blown out. In reality, there IS some data in the "blown out" sections, but I have exposed the video in post to favor the shadows.
And here's with the Sun behind me:
This side of the site is padded roughly 2 stops in post, compared to the other side, which is actually boosted 1 or 2 stops.
Anyway, I think you get the point. Exposure decisions can be tough.
D