iMovie '09 Tip: Speed Clips 2,000%

iMovie '09 brings back the capability to speed up or slow down clips, which went missing in iMovie '08. Select a clip and bring up the Clip Inspector by double-clicking the clip, clicking the Inspector button on the toolbar, or pressing the I key.

Just as with its last appearance in iMovie HD 6, you can move a slider to make the video play back slower or faster (indicated by a turtle or hare icon). The slider lets you choose several speeds: 12.5%, 25%, 50%, 100% (normal speed), 150%, 200%, 400% and 800%.

You can also enter a value into the text field to the right of the slider, and this is where things get interesting. You're not limited to the tick mark values on the slider, so you can set the speed to be 118% of normal if you want. The field below that tells you the clip's changed duration.

But you can also exceed the boundaries of the speed slider. Enter any number between 5% and 2000%:

Here's what 2000% looks like, turning this 23 second clip into a 4.5 second blur:

Tip: If you're not seeing a Speed slider, the video clip may need to be converted before iMovie can make speed adjustments. (This is the case with MPEG-4 video from Flip camcorders, for example.) In the Clip Adjustments pane, click the Convert Entire Clip button, wait a few minutes (because, as the button says, iMovie needs to convert the entire clip, not just the portion in your movie), and then the Speed slider is available.

Comments

[Claudia Frank]

For some reason I don't get the turtle for speed on my imovie 09. It's just "duration" and this just adds more of the clip I have edited not slowing the clip down. It's really frustrating.....And I don't see any reverse the clip option either. Can someone give me a tip?

[Jeff Carlson]

Claudia, iMovie may need to convert the clip before it can make speed changes. Do you see a Convert Entire Clip button in the Speed area of the Clip Adjustments window? If your clip is an MP4 file (such as from a Flip camcorder), that could be the reason you don't see the Speed slider.

(I just updated the post to reflect this, since I've gotten the question before. Thanks!)

Jeff

[aion kinah]

If you're not seeing a Speed slider, the video clip may need to be converted before iMovie can make speed adjustments.

[Katie Cotton]

i'm having a similar problem, only i do not see a convert entire clip option. Mine only shows the stabilization and then the done button.

[Katie Cotton]

ok, i see the convert clip button now, but i get an error message every time

[Clark Swofford]

Jeff,

I'm editing video from a flip camcorder in iMovie. When i convert the entire clip, i find that the video quality is dramatically reduced. Do you know if i'm just making it up or whether the conversion may be impairing the quality of my video?

[Jeff Carlson]

Clark, the video quality shouldn't be reduced, especially not "dramatically." Which model of Flip are you using?

[James]

I have trouble converting clips. Once I convert them, I try to change the speed, but I still don't see the speed slider. What am I doing wrong or what should I do? Please email me if you know.

[James]

By the way my email is glarencez@gmail.com.

[Jeff Carlson]

James, can you walk through the steps of what you're doing, and include what type of file you're converting?

[todd]

Guys I'm in a bind. I have iMovie 09, i have loaded a video that took 45 minutes to load. It's an MPEG4. I have no option to convert the clip. is it because the movie is too long? I'm hoping to use the spped up feature. Should I quit and use a different program? Is there one you can recommend?

[James]

Well, first some of the videos I need to convert are in .mov. I pressed the convert the entire clip button and once it finished converting, I still saw no speed slider. That's the part where I'm stuck.

[Jeff Carlson]

James, what do you see in place of the Convert Clip button when the conversion is done? I just tried this using a .mov video shot with a Canon Powershot G11, which needed to be converted, and as soon as it was done converting, the Convert Entire Clip button turned into the speed slider.

Have you tried deleting the com.apple.iMovie8.plist (and any other similar) file from your ~/Library/Preferences folder?

[Jeff Carlson]

Todd: Did you put the clip into a project first? You won't see the speed option in the Clip Inspector if you're looking at a movie that's still in the Event Library. Is it possible you clicked the Analyze for Stabilization button instead?

[James]

I did put the clip in first and no I didn't click the Analyze for Stabilization button.

[James]

Once it finished converting, the button didn't change. It was still the Convert Entire Clip.

[James]

My videos are from Youtube, but I converted them into .mov.

[Jeff Carlson]

Huh. That's odd. What did you use to convert them to .mov?

[James]

I used FLV Crunch.

[Jeff Carlson]

I'm afraid I'm at a loss. Things to try that come to mind are to use something else to convert the file, in case FLV Crunch is applying some compression that iMovie doesn't like; see if the same thing happens on another machine with the same video file; trash imovie's prefs (mentioned above) and restart iMovie if you haven't already done so.

Sorry!

[James]

Actually, things are fixed now. The speed slider doesn't show automatically, but it comes up later on. Thanks for all the help!

[Jeff Carlson]

Okay, that's just weird, but I'm glad it's working!

[Paul]

Hey guys. I just installed iMovie 09, and put a clip in it that was previously used in iMovie 08. I'm trying to speed it up, and I understand how to, but all I get is the "Analyze Entire Clip" Button on the clip ajustment page. What should I do?

[Paul]

Should I click that and let it Analyze for Stabilization?

[Paul]

Aha... nevermind! I hadn't moved it from the event library yet, so I was unable to see the convert clip option!. By the way... great site! has helped a lot! Thanks you guys!