#1 has a lot more than just a render with a gradient map on a gradient background... it looks like their is flames custom drawn on the render, and the background is at least 5 layers... it looks like their is two seperate gradients and two c4d fx.
You can tell some custom work has been done on the c4d fx as well, coz they have black backgrounds... (at least the ones ive seen) And the background would be dark if they didnt erase the background manually.
But yes, the corners are fairly shit...