Er since I'm in the Graphics Gale pimping mode, Graphics Gale! Great for doing pixel art animations. It supports animation natively, including onion skin (where the last frame is semi-transparent in the next one while you're editing so you can see what you're doing) and a slew of other handy features. Gimp is excellent too on the basis that it's open source, but it doesn't work with tablet PCs in portrait mode, doesn't track the stylus right, so I'm stuck with Photoshop for its sort of work. 
I do prefer Gale for pixel art and Painter for doing hand-drawn artwork anyway though.
Great work on that sprite, it's looking excellent. The only comment I have is that you could do with a little more vertical movement I think. He should bob a little bit as he runs.
I do prefer Gale for pixel art and Painter for doing hand-drawn artwork anyway though. Great work on that sprite, it's looking excellent. The only comment I have is that you could do with a little more vertical movement I think. He should bob a little bit as he runs.