Thanks everyone for your advice.
I have had a bit more success with having the foot on a different layer. Need to round off the edges a bit more so that the end of the leg doesn't pop out underneath the base of the foot when bending.

Thanks for your advice and the examples! Most appreciated. I will try the suggestion: layer bind the artwork and rotate it (as opposed to bending it.) See how that works. The leg and foot is one layer at present, so I will try editing to 2 layers, one for leg one for foot. Not sure why the foot bone...

Hi Folks I have read the topic recently about rigging images, but was wondering about this: When using Smooth Bone joints for legs, it cancels out the target bone setting for feet. I saw the layer trick with multiple smooth joints for arms works well, but only if it is a straight line with the hand ...