Jerky layer movement

Hi all,

Having a problem creating smooth transitions between my base layer and 6 additional layers.

I'd like to give the impression that these are all a single moving action, but pauses and sudden appearances make the action look herky-jerky.

The first layer displays when the base timeline ends.

Each additional layer appears when the timeline of the previous one ends.

Does the timeline for each layer have to be shorter? I do want the learner to have time to ingest all the material.

I tried having the elements in the layers fade in and out but that just made the pause longer between layers.

Can you think of anything I can do?

Having problems linking and uploading the file, so it's in the eLearning Heroes Dropbox.