HI Miguel,
About hover animation from madape is based on CSS3 only. For example they used
transform: perspective(600px) translate3d(0, 0, 0);
transform-style: preserve-3d;
animation-duration: 1s;
-webkit-animation-fill-mode: both;
animation-fill-mode: both;
So it should be possible to use this same CSS code (and hover visual effect) to SP Simple Portolio images as well.
About Grid design - SP Simple Portfolio don't have advanced options that's why that component is named "Simple".
But if this grid should be "static" not generated from X component, maybe just create it using addons and grid created using columns inside the row etc. As I see it should be quite easy.