Any luck for this to be made more compatible with animated jem models such as Fresh Animations?
Or say overrule the resource - as mod resources are placed on top of the animation pack still
https://media.essential.gg/0e3a33fe-92ec-4a55-f95d-05957eb90900

You mean compatibility with optiifine. That won't come optiifine is closed source and I have absolutely no clue what they are doing here.i can however try to make a new layer instead. See here I'm just taking the existing villager head and retexturing it. Ironically this was done to be compatible with packs that would change it