ip3 is not an image file. That extension is a native PI file. No one can view an ip3 file as it is not an image. Your image out of PI should be a tif tga or jpg (standard image file formats).
Once you got the emitter working in PI, then you could easily render out an image sequence of bugs moving across the frame and use that to map onto a 3d stand in of your character. Alas, not in PI alone.
I am rendering at the 1280 x 720 resolution, but much of my screenspace is black with the emitter taking up say only 1/2 of the space. I surmise that the black part of the image data is stored when rendering with save alpha on. Just seemed inordinately large for doing nothing but approx. doubling the resolution from 720 x 480. Thanks for the suggestion for compressed tga. The reason that I didn’t use “compressed” is I wanted artifact-free renders. Is the “lossless” compression of the tga’s truly lossless?