Mike -
Apologies, the sprites were being updated. I was confusing big head with smaller head and put the new files in the wrong directory. Though in my defense, the small head is still fairly large. Spriter is great and the more I dig into it the more i like it. Thanks.
Lucid-
Ive tried your advice and was able to change the angle of the bone using the Override Object Animation action. My problem now is that once I override the angle the bone stays at that angle until I change it again...but it never goes back to what ever angle(s) it needs to be for each animation. For example; aim and shoot animation has the front_hand bone at ~0 degrees. If I override it -15 degrees and back again to 0 degrees (to simulate recoil) the bone stays at 0 degress for every animation afterward. I dont see an action that allows the animation to "revert" back to what they were before the override. If there is a way to revert, it would work perfectly. Ill keep at it. Thanks again for the advice.