You Can’t Copy/Paste Speed Ramps in Final Cut Pro X

Scot Yount’s question was simple:

How do you copy/paste speed ramps in Final Cut Pro X?

The answer, which surprised me, is that you can’t.

As I experimented with this, here’s what I learned:

• You CAN copy and paste constant speed changes using either Edit > Paste Effects or Edit > Paste Attributes.
• You CAN reset the speed of any clip using constant or variable speed changes back to normal using Modify > Retime > Normal (shortcut: Shift – N).
• You CAN copy a clip containing speed ramps to a new location in the Timeline.
• But you CAN’T copy and paste speed ramps between clips.

EXTRA CREDIT

• Edit > Paste Effects (shortcut: Option + Cmd + V) pastes all effects from the source clip into the selected destination clip(s).
• Edit > Paste Attributes (shortcut: Shift + Cmd + V) pastes only those effects that you select in the Paste Attributes window into the selected destination(s).

The Retiming option (lower red arrow) in Paste Attributes only applies to constant speed changes applied to a clip; either slow or fast motion. Speed ramps are ignored.