Saturday 24th October- Meeting up at Elena's house to take the group photo for our magazine covers

On Saturday, I went to Elena's house to meet with the whole group so we could take pictures for our magazine cover.

I put on my make-up when I got to the house. Apart from the usual natural looking make-up, I put on bright aqua sparkly eye-shadow and pink lip-gloss. This was because of my character and we think that as I am a lesbian, I do not have the dress-sense or same sense of what is attractive because my character is not trying to appeal to the opposite sex.

Shadie's boyfriend Moji was there and so was Anna's boyfriend Dervish. These two boys are going to be playing crucial parts in our soap trailer, so it was important that they were in the photo. Elena will not be playing one of the main roles- so she was taking the photo instead of being in the photo herself.

In the end, I chose to wear purple tights with dark blue denim shorts, a bright pink lace-up corset-style top, a short-sleeved zip-up star-pattern hoodie and low black peep-toe heels. I wore grey ankle-high converses to Elena's house however i took the black heels in my bag so that as a group, we could decide which ones were more suitable for wearing during the photo being taken. So we decided that as everyone else was dressed quite formally, and what I was wearing was already really colorful and punkish in style, the heels would be better, to make my character look like she had made an effort as well as the others, despite her character.

Shadie wore more plain clothes. Her character is not openly lesbian so her true sexuality is a secret, therefore she would not be wearing clashing clothes unless she was with my character, and we also felt that we did not want to give away too much of the storyline away in the photo, so therefore, she is dressed plainly and normally like the other characters.

Anna was wearing a black long sleeved top tucked into a black mini-skirt with black tights and black court shoes. I think this fitted her role nicely because she is a nice sensible girl, however she also likes to party. So the sensible colour black- however- fitted and sexy- conveys both sensibility and maturity to wear something like that and pull it off with confidence.

Dervish was wearing a shirt and jeans. This portrays his character as the sensible, caring boyfriend of Anna. He will probably also be playing the role of Anna's rapist, however, we will never see the rapist's face. Although, as a group, we are thinking that, when playing the role of the rapist, dervish should wear dark clothes including rough jeans, a dark top, a large over-coat and a cap- for keeping his head down.

Moji was wearing a shirt tucked into jeans with a belt. This portrays his character as sensible and caring more about being obedient and smart rather than sexually attractive. This fits, because his character is the suitor Shadei's parents find for her to marry.

We took a number of different group photos in different ways, based on group photo research from existing soaps and dramas such as 'Gossip Girl' and 'Friends'. For some of the photos, I was lying down at the front, and for others, I was standing up next to Shadie. In other photos, I was holding Shadie's hand and laughing, and then for others, I was just sitting on the same chair as her so that we would all fit nicely into the photo, but there was nothing sexual going on between us. We were just looking at the camera.

We took at least four pictures for each different type of photo so that we would have more than enough photos. Because- the risk of taking too few photos would have been that- becuase there are six of us- there would have been many mistakes and situations where expressions were inappropriate because photos were taken at the wrong time. So the more photos taken- the better.

At the end, Shadie and I had a photo taken together so that we can use it on our magazine covers if we want to. It is one of the main stories so it is important.

Anna and Dervish are going to photoshop the photos to improve them and pick the best ones, and then Anna will put them as a draft onto her blog so that, as a group, we can look at them in class and chose which ones we want to use.