Rendered backgrounds... sort of

I've been debating with myself and teachers over how I want my backgrounds to be rendered. Here's an example I've done in Flash 8:



It's very clean and I like how clearly everything appears, even if there isn't much to see at this point. You can get very clean lines in Flash and the colours really stand out. However I'll be rendering the characters in Flash aswell so I don't know how clearly they'll stand out if I also render the backgrounds in Flash aswell.

Here's another example done in Painter 10:



I really like the painted style and how much detail I'll be able to include, but if the objects are going to be rendered in Flash then they'll stand out too much. I could make the objects in Painter then import them to Flash, but that means I'll have
to make loads of dud objects so it won't be too easy for the player to spot them. The Flash rendered characters will really stand out if I use this method, which is what I want.

I'm probably going to go down the Painter route as I'll be able to achieve the detail of the backgrounds I want, whereas I would be kinda limited if I did it in Flash.