Animating Without Paid Software: Making a Floating Cube in Google Slides

For the Make It Float challenge, I wanted to create the illusion of motion, summoning, rotation, floating, movement, and explosion, all without relying on paid software or tools with a steep learning curve. Instead of using programs like Houdini or Lightroom, I chose Google Slides. While it isn’t designed for animation, it is 100% free for all tools, familiar, and accessible to nearly anyone. All that’s required is an email and a device, which means anyone can start creating immediately.

This project demonstrates that compelling motion and visual effects don’t depend on specialized software, but on creativity, timing, and intention. By animating a cube being summoned, rotated, moved through space, and ultimately exploded using simple slide incremental changes, I was able to simulate floating and transformation within a tool anyone with a devices already has access to.

Accessibility in creative tools matters. Many people are discouraged from experimenting with animation due to cost or technical barriers. Using Google Slides lowers that barrier and reframes animation as something approachable rather than exclusive. This approach encourages experimentation, learning, and creativity, especially for beginners.

To view the final animation, click the YouTube link below. To view the original animation before being exported, click the Google Slides link and put it into presentation mode and press the right arrow after letting it load for a bit for the best results.

YouTube Link

Google Slides Link

Supplies

1. A device that can run Google Slides.
2. A mouse can be very helpful but isn't required
3. The only platform used was Google Slides (Free browser application or Mobile App) https://workspace.google.com/products/slides/
4. Time and patience
5. Link to the images I created for this Instructable: LINK

Helpful Slides tools:

1. Polyline
2. Curve
3. Shape
4. Text Box
5. Word Art

Helpful shortcuts:

1. Copy shapes or text (Ctrl C)
2. Paste shapes or text (Ctrl V)
3. Undo (Ctrl Z)
4. Zoom in (Ctrl +) for detail work
5. Zoom out (Ctrl -) to check composition
6. To select multiple objects hold shift
7. Hold shift while resizing to keep proportions
8. Hold shift while rotating to snap angles
9. Group objects (Ctrl Alt G)
10. Ungroup objects (Ctrl Shift Alt G)

Tips:

1. Instead of dragging shapes or text, using the arrow keys can be more precise. For slower movement just use the arrow keys, but for larger movements, use shift and the arrow keys.
2. Set Slide size to Custom (File → Page setup) for better proportions depending on your animation goals
3. Use blank slides to avoid layout restrictions
4. Turn on Guides (View → Guides) to align drawings precisely
5. Use Custom colors for consistency across frames
6. Remove borders as much as possible for cleaner looks (Border color → Transparent)
7. Adjust Transparency for shading, highlights, or motion blur effects
8. Right-click → Order (Bring forward / Send backward) to control depth
9. Group complex elements to avoid accidental movement (Right-click → Group)

Animation Tips (Frame-by-Frame Style)

1. Duplicate slides to create frames (Ctrl + D)
2. Move objects slightly between slides for smooth motion
3. Right-click on the slides window → Skip Slide to skip slides without deleting them which is very helpful for saving work or assets for later in one place

What to do & why: Start by thinking about the concept you want to animate, especially how it relates to the theme. Sketch out a few ideas and pick one that is visually striking but achievable. Brainstorming helps you define the story and overall motion before committing to frames. Don't be afraid to adjust your list as you continue through this process.

What I did: I focused on the idea of “floating” and decided to animate a cube being summoned, rotating, floating, and then exploding. I also wanted a creative, full-screen animation at the beginning to immediately capture attention. This gave me a clear vision for the rest of the process. Below is my initial list of ideas.

1. Cube Spinning in and taking over the screen
2. Hand hovering something
3. Space astronaut floating with cube - removed from final animation
4. Cube crashing into water - removed from final animation
5. Cube spinning across the screen
6. Cube exploding

What to do & why: Create a rough timeline of your animation. Break the action into stages, appearance, motion, transformation, and conclusion. This ensures that your animation has structure and pacing before you start creating frames.

What I did: I mapped the cube’s journey: being summoned, rotating, floating, and exploding. Plotting these key moments helped me see the order of events and how long each would last.

Pro Tip! - Create a visual timeline of your animation by placing keyframes in sequence across a single slide or section. Include small thumbnails of the cube at each stage, especially useful for planning, explaining, or presenting frame-by-frame motion without needing the full slideshow preview.

What to do & why: Prepare the shapes, characters, or objects you’ll animate. Having assets ready keeps you from redrawing the same thing repeatedly and makes it easier to maintain consistency.

What I did: I created a cube asset with 96 frames or slides for rotation and drafted a hand frame for the summoning effect. Having these ready allowed me to place them on multiple slides efficiently and then manipulate them.

Link to assets I made: LINK

Pro Tip! - Use transparent shapes for guides. Invisible rectangles can help maintain spacing and alignment between frames.

What to do & why: Decide on a limited color palette to maintain visual cohesion. Consistent colors make shading and motion clearer and give your animation a professional look.

What I did: I chose black and white with shades of grey. This simple palette made the cube stand out and helped with shadows, highlights, and movement clarity across frames. I also made a transparent filter color palette which was helpful for shading and other aspects of the animation.

Link to color palette and transparency filters I made which will prompt you to make your own copy for personal use: LINK

Pro Tip! - Reserve bright or contrasting colors for key moments or highlights, guiding attention to important actions

What to do & why: Identify the most important frames where major actions happen. Keyframes anchor your animation and guide how everything in between should move.

What I did: My keyframes included the cube being summoned, reaching its peak rotation, floating across the screen, and exploding. These defined the animation’s core moments. Some examples are above from my animation.

Pro Tip! - Duplicate keyframes multiple times for emphasis. For example, slow down critical moments like explosions or summoning.

What to do & why: Fill in rough frames between keyframes to create smoother motion. Don’t worry about details yet but instead focus on the movement and placement.

What I did: I added transitional frames that moved the cube incrementally between keyframes. This made the motion feel continuous rather than jumpy.

Pro Tip! - Use consistent spacing between frames. Small, equal increments create smoother motion.

What to do & why: Go back through all frames and add finer details like shading, highlights, or small adjustments. Details make the animation visually satisfying and more realistic.

What I did: I refined the hand and cube’s edges, added subtle shading, and adjusted the hand frame, enhancing the overall visual effect.

Pro Tip! - Use text boxes or slide notes to mark key actions or timing cues.

What to do & why: Try adding simple effects like opacity changes, layering, or duplication to create motion blur, glow, or depth. Experimentation can make the animation more dynamic.

What I did: I layered partially translucent shapes to simulate shadows and depth during the cube summoning portion.

Pro Tip! - Keep effects and object consistent and make sure edits don’t unintentionally change between frames.

What to do & why: When moving quickly, you tend to make small mistakes. Be sure to review each frame carefully for inconsistencies, misalignments, or unwanted overlaps. Cleaning up early prevents errors from being noticeable when the animation plays.

What I did: I corrected misaligned shapes, consistent shadows, and any accidental overlaps to ensure a polished final look.

Pro Tip! - Zoom in for precision. Zooming while adjusting objects reduces alignment mistakes.

What to do & why: Some actions need to move slower or faster. Duplicate frames to make key moments linger or trim frames to speed up movement. Proper timing gives the animation a natural flow.

What I did: I duplicated certain slides to slow down the rotation and exploding sequences, making the animation smoother and emphasizing important actions.

Pro Tip! - Check timing against perception. Play your animation at full speed to see if the viewer can clearly follow each action.

What to do & why: Show your animation in progress to friends, classmates, or peers. Fresh eyes can spot timing issues or unclear motion that you might miss. Feedback helps refine your animation.

What I did: I shared my draft animation and made small adjustments based on suggestions, particularly smoothing transitions and clarifying the summoning effect.

Pro Tip! - Seek feedback early. Share rough keyframes or a simple prototype before adding all details to catch major issues quickly.

What to do & why: Including sound effects or background music can enhance the animation’s impact. Plan where sounds should occur to match key actions.

What I did: I didn’t add sound in this project, but in future iterations, I would sync sound with the cube’s summoning and explosion for added effect.

Pro Tip! - Plan audio first. Decide if you want sound effects, music, or narration before animating, so movements sync properly.

What to do & why: Regularly view your slides in presentation mode to check pacing, motion, and visual clarity. Testing early prevents major issues later. I recommend you test it in presentation mode and export it if needed, as viewing it as a sequence lets you catch last-minute timing or visual issues.

What I did: I previewed the animation frequently, slide by slide, to ensure the cube’s movements appeared smooth.

Pro Tip! - Make small adjustments immediately – Fix minor issues before moving on to avoid compounding errors.

What to do & why: Once your animation is complete, export it (as a video, GIF, or image sequence) or share it online. This allows others to see your work as intended.

What I did: I uploaded the final animation by screen recording to YouTube so it could be easily viewed in motion, capturing the cube’s summoning, rotation, floating, and explosion.

Pro Tip! - You can even use Google Vids with your slideshow to export the video directly from Google Slides.

Google Slides is not designed for animation, and this project is not an argument that it should be. Professional tools exist because they streamline motion, timing, and iteration, things that must be done manually in Slides. Every movement in this project required duplicating slides, adjusting positions by hand, and reviewing sequences repeatedly.

This approach should be considered a last resort, not a recommended workflow. The limitations are significant, and they directly impact efficiency. However, working within these constraints makes the labor behind animation visible and exposes how much extra effort is required when proper tools are unavailable.

This project represents over 250+ hours of work, experimentation, and iteration. Google Slides is where I originally started exploring digital art and animation, so returning to it over six years later for this project felt full circle. However, even with years of experience, animating in Google Slides is not an efficient or practical approach and should be considered a last-resort tool rather than an ideal one. Producing this animation required an extreme investment of time and patience, which highlights how high the barrier can be, even for someone who knows what they’re doing.

I chose to work this way not only to highlight the lack of accessible, free animation tools, but also to explore what is possible when those resources aren’t available at all. I wanted to push the limits of a tool most people already have access to and see how far creativity, problem-solving, and persistence could go without professional software.

The primary challenges I faced were not creativity or technical ability, but time and endurance. Every movement required manual duplication, careful adjustment, and constant review. Experiencing this further reinforced how creators without access to paid tools are often forced to work significantly harder just to participate, something that nearly discouraged me at the very beginning of my creative journey.

While this project proves that animation can be created in Google Slides, it also exposes the reality that accessibility in creative software is still limited. Creativity should not be defined by the tools you can afford, nor should meaningful creation require overcoming unnecessary barriers just to begin.

This project demonstrates that convincing motion is built on fundamentals, not software features. The illusion of floating, rotation, and transformation was achieved entirely through spacing, timing, and consistency across frames. No automated motion paths or physics systems were involved.

At the same time, the project highlights a disparity: when access to tools is limited, the barrier is not imagination but workload. The result may be possible, but it is far more demanding.

Floating in this animation is communicated visually rather than physically. The cube appears suspended through gradual position changes, controlled rotation, and intentional pauses. Scale and spacing were adjusted incrementally to suggest depth and movement through space.

Because all motion was constructed frame by frame, floating becomes a matter of perception, how the viewer reads continuity, rather than a feature generated by software. This aligns the animation directly with the challenge’s theme by focusing on illusion rather than simulation.

Create a new Google Slides file and animate a single shape across 10–50 slides using only duplication and small movements. Avoid built-in animations and focus on consistency between frames.

When played in sequence, notice how motion emerges from minimal changes. This exercise demonstrates both the potential and the limitations of accessible tools, and offers insight into how animation fundamentals operate without automation.

Google Slide link to example mini project: LINK

YouTube link to example mini project: LINK