As it turns out Animstrip is very easy to use. I just needed art. The best way of course would be a snazzy 3D critter I could just rotate around to get all the images I needed for the sprite sheets. But that is beyond my capability. So for my first creature I decided on a blinking effect for my ghosts, just to get used to the animation program.
I was pretty pleased with the effect. I wanted creepy child ghosts, but nothing real clear. No walking or amination of limbs needed for this one.
Next creature I needed was rats. I found some spritesheets to look off of for reference and printed out an isometric grid to lay under tracing paper to help me get the angle right. Then I got to drawing. Since these guys are small I decided against making all the walking poses and settled for tail swishing.
They'll do I suppose. Way too cute. Oh well. I move on.
The next thing I needed were my pineheads. Pineheads are members of the Aerian military that have been cursed. So I needed full walking animation spritesheets for all directions on the isometric grid.
I worked on the drawings for these off and on for almost a month. It was tedious, and the results are imperfect. But for wooden men, that works for now.