Pyramidal holographics have become popular fast, with crowdfunding projects offering you ways to get into the game for just hundreds of dollars, but here is a way to put together your own small-scale version effectively for free.

Required tools: a smartphone, compact disc case, graph paper, pen, scissors, knife, tape or superglue. Basically, you cut a partial pyramid from the clear material, fasten it together, set it on your phone, and load up a video that turns those surfaces into four-way reflectors simulating the visual experience of objects moving in midair.

Critics will argue that this is not a true hologram and that is absolutely true, but the effect is nonetheless extremely compelling, and you can use it to animate not just the examples above but basically anything you want as well. The next step: scale things up and turn a television or computer screen into your base and buy a larger surface for the reflection.

Or, for additional easy fun, try this hand-drawn hologram tutorial (above) – it won’t be quite as visually complex or impressive, but it is still a neat trick to show friends or kids.