Particles

I am using particles for their painterly effects. They are causing some problems however:

-Mac render crashes
-Using lots of emitters causes crashes
-Moving particles in 3D space is hard to visualize since they have no real 3D presence

Here is a screenshot of the navigation I have that unfortunately doesn't make sense for the interaction. The user scenario
I have in mind is for several participants - I'm unclear how the movement is going to animated though, through cameras, objects, or some combination thereof.