Carlos “Carl” V. Girod Jr., former SMPTE director of engineering, died in a Morristown, N.J., hospital on Dec. 29. He was 69.
Girod had retired from SMPTE in 2007, after 11 years with that organization. During his tenure, Girod made numerous contributions to standards development within the motion imaging industry.
Before joining SMPTE, Girod had worked in engineering positions at the CBS Television Network in New York and at PBS in Alexandria, Va.
Girod was an accomplished musician, and some SMPTE members may remember him as the sponsor of an unscheduled “mystery” speaker at the close of one day’s proceedings at the 2003 SMPTE conference in New York City. The speaker turned to be the legendary guitarist Les Paul, who presented an extemporaneous speech about his career and became an instant hit at the show.
Girod was a SMPTE Fellow, a member of the IEEE, and was a licensed professional engineer in the states of New Jersey and New York. He was graduate of the Newark College of Engineering (now the New Jersey Institute of Technology), and received an MBA degree from the Fordham University Graduate School of Business Administration.
At the time of his death, Girod was a resident of Florham Park, N.J.
Survivors include his widow, Andriana, and three children. Funeral services for Girod were conducted in Madison, N.J., on Jan. 3.
