Jonno said:

That's a fair argument, though there's also the possibility that they might have upmixed the Dolby Stereo rather than sourcing and digitising the 6-track... I don't know what the approach was in the early days of AC-3.

I'll see what I can do about the book stills. Do you want to work up a list of problematic scenes, and I'll dig out the relevant images?

Back in the early AC-3 LD days, Fox did pull a few of their 5.1 (or 4.1) tracks from a 70mm mixes. I know for sure Die Hard and Patton (has dialog panning) were from the 70mm mix. But we are talking about Aliens and I have zero evidence that it is from the 70mm and an upmix is just as likely. I will know more when I capture it and compare it to the DVDs and BD. I hope back then they wanted a more true to source mix then a super cool remix like today.

No rush Jonno, if you are busy. With a great source like that book it can very helpful and I can't get a copy at the moment. As Starthoughts noticed I am having problems with reds. I did a loseless AVI copy of both the Alien and Aliens LDs. There appears to be a bit of red smearing on the capture as a result of the usual Pioneer LD issues. For example here is the scene I'm in midst of regrading (not finished yet):

BD (Top)/LD (Middle)/BD with LD Colors (Bottom)

I have been pulling the red back a bit to compensate but a pic of it (Ripley refusing to let Dallas and Lambert back in the ship) would help me figure out skin tones. Hell any pic of people would help in skin tones. Also maybe Dallas in the Mother computer room, Ash's decapacitated head and Brett walking into the gold room before he is killed. Like I said no hurry, if you can't find the book, no worries