" Things like that are some of the most difficult things in computer graphics/animation." I think not. After Effects will render sand in real time & so will combustion or 3d studio max. Its vue that has no particle generators so it is difficult to achieve. Compositing the sand effect is your best result with Vue. War craft 3 has a movie with a sand city that is crushed with a monsters hands that is awesome. Blizzard makes the best animations. Vue4pro should have a particle generator because it is a mid and going higher priced package. Vue4pro needs more differences then Vue4 and a particle generator would be a welcomed addition to that list. With that in mind a python script can make a particle system that reacts to the wind as the trees do. Now we need to make it.