Here's an old VEG that has both particles and smoke with text. I didn't create it.

Text to Smoke.veg

You really need a 3D application for this. All those particles means lots of polygons to animate and render.

You could probably fudge it using one of Satish's FXs (free from debugmode.com) to shatter the text into lots of fragments and then turn them into emitters using Particle Illusion (not free) to create the sparkles.

Bob.

Ulead Cool 3D Studio is what I use to produce this effect, but you'll need to play with colors to get the pieces to sparkle - and even then the sparkle effect will be muted. But it's an inexpensive program, easy to learn, and you might be able to doctor the rendered video file that you get from it by putting it into Vegas and the using Fx from within Vegas.

Thx, all.

Also, Blufftitler has a particle generator. It is inexpensive and also easy to learn. Google it and see for yourself.

David