ELLA Hughes smiles at the camera and peels off her clothes to reveal her red lacy underwear.
The former law student, from Birmingham, is filming a porn movie – something she's been doing for the last four years after dropping out of uni to become a full-time sex worker.
After struggling to make ends meet on a student loan, Ella became a spanking model – paid to be spanked by other performers in online videos – before turning to porn to make a living.
But when her classmates found out about her sideline sex hustle, they bullied her to the point she left her course.
Now the 23-year-old is an award-winning porn star who earns up to £30,000 a month shooting adult movies.
Ella – who features in Channel 5’s Student Sex Workers tonight – is among the estimated one in 20 students who become sex workers to earn extra cash.
While Ella is upbeat about her experiences, sex work is not a positive experience for everybody and many girls are forced into filming abusive or violent scenes, or are abused in other ways.
For student sex workers, peer pressure and strict codes of conduct, mean universities can take action against students who bring the institution into disrepute, lead to many not completing their degree.
'I got spanked for eight hours a day for £400'
When Ella accepted her place at Southampton Solent University she planned to become a criminal profiler, working with the police to prevent crime and catch perpetrators.
But the long hours of lectures, five days a week, made it difficult for her to find the part-time work that many students rely on to top up their student loans.
A friend suggested she tried modelling and Ella soon discovered she could earn good money for lingerie shoots and even more for specialist videos on fetish sites – specifically being spanked by other performers.
She tells the Sun Online: “I saw an advert for spanking videos, paying £300 a day.
“I was really into the bondage side of things so I thought ‘why not get paid for it too’ and I soon became a regular model for them.
“Weirdly, in 2015, I was named one of the top three ‘spankees’ in the UK and won an award.”
Ella would work on the shoots for six to eight hours, earning up to £400 a day for four videos, but she admits the spanking took an emotional toll.
She says: “That amount of heavy duty spanking can take a toll mentally if you’re not prepared.
“You have to have a high pain threshold and trust the people who will be topping [spanking].
“You have to know what your body is capable of receiving and know how to look after yourself after the shoot, how to care for the marks and how to deal with emotions.
“After a shoot I would get very emotional due to the concentration and the headspace spanking takes you into.”
'My first porn shoot was the best 20 minutes of my life'
Ella’s videos soon brought her to the attention of porn producers and she was inundated with offers to try something more hardcore – having full sex on screen.
“At first I was like ‘hell no, I’m not doing that.’ Then I slept on it and I had a look at the videos,” she says. “I remember watching them and thinking ‘I want to do that.’
“For the first shoot, I was nervous of course. I was well informed so I knew what I was getting myself in for – but I was still apprehensive about how it would go, if I’d enjoy it or if I’d hate it and never want to do it ever again.
“But I threw myself into the job and got it done. Once the camera is rolling, it’s almost like you become a different person and you can switch the nerves on and off.”
She adds: “I had a whole epiphany in that scene. I loved it. It was the best 20 minutes of my life. I wasn’t expecting it to be that way. I realised this was what I was going to do with my life.”
'Law and porn don't mix'
Ella’s first video was viewed by four million people and, while this meant the offers and the cash started rolling in, the success had dire consequences at uni.
“News spreads fast around campus – it’s difficult to keep anything quiet in that situation,” she says.
“Some of my fellow students were rude, some made comments or had digs at me online.
“Some just said nothing but you could tell what they were thinking.
“Some even contacted me asking if I wanted to go for a drink with them and their mates and have threesomes etc – expecting me to say yes because that’s what I do for a job. I was angry that they expect me to do it for free."
Ella was also horrified when news of her new porn career reached her family before she had a chance to tell them, but to her relief, they proved supportive.
“Mum said as long as I’m safe and happy that’s all that matters,” she says.
Because of the reaction of her classmates, Ella stopped going to lectures and the comments continued to come in online, leaving her feeling she "was being crushed."
Eventually, after a discussion with university officials who told her “law and porn don’t mix”, Ella decided to leave the university and finish her degree through the Open University.
Three years on Ella is an award-winning porn star who also runs her own “premium lines”, making 10-minute custom videos for clients who pay between £100 and £500 a film.
“It’s ten minutes work but it’s not easy work,” she says. “It’s hard. You have to concentrate and be there for the person who has ordered the custom. Me reaching orgasm is how all the videos end.”
'Porn stars are the cleanest people around'
As an adult performer, Ella is tested for sexually transmitted infections on a fortnightly basis and wouldn’t be allowed on set without a health certificate.
Tonight's programme points out that 53 per cent of sexually active students never get tested.
“The perception of people in the adult industry is that we’re not clean, we’re riddled with STIs and diseases and it’s not true.
“I have seen how people live at university and they’re not careful and don’t get tested.
“I’ve had a clean bill of health for four years since I’ve been in this industry and I know that I am completely safe.
“We are the cleanest people you’ve ever come across.”
Ella admits there is a huge downside to porn work and advises anyone thinking about it to research thoroughly and be prepared for the backlash.
"It’s not something to take lightly, not just because of the kind of work you’ll be doing," she says.
"For me the worst part of this industry is the lack of respect I get from the general public, the disregard I receive, the death threats, abuse thrown at me, comments, name calling and making me feel lower than low. "
Ella, who says she can never go back to law despite passing her degree, now has two gongs from the UK Adult Producers awards and was recently named Paul Raymond’s female performer of the year at a separate award ceremony.
“Coming from uni where I was bullied and school where I was very harshly bullied, to come in to an industry where I am celebrated is a huge contrast,” she says tearfully.
“I wouldn’t want to go back to law. I believe I’ve found my path and I’m more than happy that this is the way my life has turned out.”
Yesterday's episode featured Jasmine, a model and exotic dancer who turned to webcam work when she was booted of her paramedic degree.
Student Sex Workers airs tonight at 10pm on Channel 5
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