Speaking from experience- After effects light glow

As I would need to spend £300 to buy the Trapcode Particular plug in to create the Swirls effect I have decided to look for a different effect for the 'Magic' message.  The same tutorials has another which shows you how to create an Illuminating title with colour casting in 3D 


http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorial/light_glow/


The effect he created was like this: