Free flash sprite creation tool?

Short version: Is there a free-to-use tool similar to Adobe Flash Professional that can create and animate (vector) sprites for use with FlashDevelop?

Long version: I’ve steered clear of Flash up until now because I don’t want to fork out $700 when every other language I’ve written in has a free compiler and IDE available. I’m giving it a try now that I know about FlashDevelop, but that lacks the ability to make and animate vector sprites, which seems to be one of Flash’s strengths. I’m considering making a tool with these abilities in Flash and hosting it here. I want to first make sure I’m not re-inventing the wheel. Wikipedia led me to the Ajax Animator (http://antimatter15.com/ajaxanimator/wave/), but that seems quite limited (it’s possible I just didn’t play with it long enough). So, does anyone know whether something like this already exists?

http://www.synfig.org/cms/
http://www.pencil-animation.org/
http://vectorian.com/giotto/

I’ve never used any of those, but that’s what google’s showing me.

Thanks! I think your third link might fit the bill; in fact I searched a bit more and found this tutorial:
http://forums.epicgames.com/threads/802824-Scaleform-UI-without-Flash-Vectorian-Giotto-and-FlashDevelop