I am doing an art project where i have to create a video. I have only less than a week left before it has to be in as it is for my GCSE final grade. Anyhow, im half way through it and last night i followed the light streaks tutorial (http://www.videocopilot.net/videotutorials/nano2/), however, now i can not render this part of my project which is only 15 seconds long and has three clips in it. After effects crashes half way through the render between 158-165 frames out of 305 and says that there was an error "invoking advanced 3d plug in " trapcode particular. please can somebody help me because i only have less than 5 days to get this done and its my final GCSE...

Sounds more like a question for either (or both) Adobe support or Trapcode support.

I would make sure you have iinstalled any latest patches/versions of both After Effects and trapcode Particular though to ensure compatibility. Also, make sure your video driver is up to date.

I can direct you to a 'Trapcode' specific forum where you might get a better answer to this question than you're likely to get from here, a general forum. PM me for details if you want them.

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I'm not young enough to know everything!

I would try rendering with different codecs. Also if you have the production studio I would try use the dynamic link to open the compostion in premiere pro and render it out in that program. I have been able to render out several comp's this way that kept crashing when rendered directly in after effects. I have know idea why this is, just know thats what happend.
Is it possible that your system doesnt have enough memory to create a particular frame. 15 seconds can be pretty long in after effects when you start using longs of filters/plug-ins/effects, especially particle systems.
You could also try rendering out up to say frame 158, where it normally crashes and then try to render out the remaining 147 frames into a separate file and then connect them again once rendered.
Unless of course it is something to do with your hardware or something. But in that case I dont know why you would be able to get particluar to work while you edited it.