I am a newbie so any help is greatly appriciated.

I am trying to make two images animate along parrallel diagonal lines. The images are large diagonal stripes. One image will start from top left the other from bottom right, ending up adjacent to one another. My issue is that the layers overlap and cause the lower layer to become covered by the upper layer and therefor not seen because they are large and more imporantly rectangular. Is there a way to make the layers fit only to the images so that there is not a large amount of masking by the top layer. Or is there a way to animate an image without using a layer. I am under the impression that the only way to animate an image is within a layer. I hope I have been clear in what im trying to do.

Thanks in advance for any assistance !!!!