El Observador

Infobox Television
show_name = El Observador


caption =
format = News program
runtime = Variable
creator = William H. Phelps, Jr.
starring = Erika Paz & Isnardo Bravo Ana Virginia Escobar & Miguel Angel Rodriguez Roxana Castillo & Pedro Guerrero
country = VEN
network = RCTV (1953-present)
first_aired = November 16, 1953
last_aired = Present
num_episodes =

El Observador (English: The Observer) is a spanish-language newscast aired by Radio Caracas Televisión.

History

"El Observador de Creole"

Presented by The Creole Oil Company (a subsidiary of Standard Oil of New Jersey), "El Observador de Creole" was Venezuela's first regular news program. The face and voice of Francisco Amado Pernía animated the newcasts from Monday to Saturday and Sunday the newscast corresponded to Cristóbal Rodríquez Pantoja. Seeing that the majority of the personnel that created RCTV originally came from Radio Caracas (later known as Radio Caracas Radio to differentiate it from Radio Caracas Televisión), it was easy to comprehend that radio personalities such as Amable Espina, Carlos Quintana Negrón, Marco Antonio de Lacavalerie, and Pedro José Fajardo participated in the contest run by The Creole Oil Company to select their pair of hosts for their news program.

According to some sources, "El Observador de Creole" first went on the air on November 16, 1953, one day after the inauguration of Radio Caracas Televisión, but José Luis Sarzalejo, manager of the telefilm department of the network at the time, claimed that the first newscast aired on November 15 at 8pm.

Everyday, 300 national and international news stories were processed as so were a significant number of photographs and material in 35mm. This consumed an average of 240 feet of film (which was about seven minutes in playtime). The first technical team of the program were Juan Zabala (first technical director), Mario Corro (operator of the video control), Alejandro Wessolowski (coordinator), Alcides Longa (cinematographic editor), Ramiro Vegas (cinematographic coordinator), and Antonio Di Mola (studio photographer).

In 1971, RCTV decided to eliminate sole sponsors. The Creole Oil Company moved to Cadena de Venezolana de Televisión (CVTV) on January 3, 1972, and remained there for the rest of the time that the company remained in Venezuela, which was a little less than two years.

El Observador Venezolano

When The Creole Oil Company moved to CVTV, they took two very important things from RCTV: one was El Observador Creole and the other was its host Francisco Amado Pernía. This loss obligated the directors of the network to search for a new presenter and Eladio Lárez, current president of RCTV, was selected to be the conductor of El Observador Venezolano, a variation of the original newscast. Other presenters of El Observador Venezolano included Guillermo Vilchez, Antonio José Marcano, and Inés Sancho.

In 1975, RCTV introduced the figure of reporters to their newscast. Marietta Santana and Darcy Alvarado were the network's first.

In the early 1980s, El Observador Venezolano became known simply as El Observador.

El Observador

Over the years, El Observador had been hosted by a number of people including Franklin Villasmil, Tinedo Guia (now retired), Alba Cecilia Mujica (now at Globovisión), Jaime Suarez (now at Televen), and Kristina Wetter.

On July 18, 2005, the "Centro Nacional de Noticias" (eng: "National Center for News"), El Observador's new headquarters, was inaugurated. The ribbon was cut by Empresas 1BC Director Marcel Granier and RCTV President Eladio Larez. It is located in Quinta Crespo, a neighborhood in central Caracas where Radio Caracas Television's other studios can be found.

On December 28, 2006, President Hugo Chávez announced that the government would not renew RCTV's broadcast license when it expired in May 2007, thus bringing RCTV and El Observador's terrestrial transmission history to an end. [http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061229/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/venezuela_media_1] .

After the shutdown of RCTV on terrestrial television, El Observador became a webcast, with newscasts being uploaded onto YouTube [ [http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=elobservadorenlinea YouTube - elobservadorenlinea's Channel ] ] , venezuelapress.com, and El Observador's own website. It was also aired on the last remaining opposition network, Globovisión. During this period, the El Observador channel on YouTube had the most subscribers of all YouTube users.

El Observador returned when RCTV relaunched as a cable and satellite channel on July 16, 2007.

News Team

"Anchors"
*Isnardo Bravo - morning anchor
*Roxana Castillo - evening anchor
*Ana Virginia Escobar - noon anchor
*Pedro Guerrero - evening anchor
*Erika Paz - morning anchor
*Miguel Angel Rodriguez - noon anchor

"Reporters"
*Atamaica Briceño - based in Lara
*Laura Castellanos
*Anahis Cruz - based in Zulia
*Jackeline Dos Ramos - based in Nueva Esparta
*Liliana Elias - based in Bolívar
*Jessica Flores
*Enler Garcia - based in Anzoátegui
*Iris Garcia
*Javier Garcia (murdered)
*Maria Elisa Gonzalez
*Yamile Jimenez - based in Táchira
*Yanitza Leon
*David Perez Hansen
*Jose Pernalete
*Edward Rodriguez - based in Zulia
*Darwyn Rosales - based in Carabobo
*Eillen Salomon - based in Aragua

"Graphic Designers"
*Oswaldo Malpica (1996-1998)
*Jorge Zambrano (1999-2001)
*Ayaris Prato (2002-2008)

Management

Eduardo Sapene is the vice president of information and special programs at Radio Caracas Television. His department is in charge of managing El Observador.

ee also

*List of programs broadcast by RCTV
*Radio Caracas Television (RCTV)

References

External links

* [http://elobservador.rctv.net/ El Observador]
* [http://www.youtube.com/elobservadorenlinea El Observador's YouTube site]
* [http://www.venezuelapress.com/ venezuelapress.com]
* [http://impresodigital.el-nacional.com/aniversario/print.asp?file=E:-x-www-x-ElNacional-x-Home-x-aniversario-x-2002-x-08-x-03-x-n5_2n1.asp History of El Observador]