BIG BROTHER: NO PLACE TO HIDE; Brand-new house has heat-seeking cameras, outdoor showers, transparent walls and only 11 beds for the 13 housemates.. there will be no escape in the claustrophobic atmosphere of BB6.

Byline: From Brian McIver, inside the Big Brother House

THE beds are made, the table is set and 13 housemates are about to get unlucky in the Big Brother house.

The hit reality show starts its sixth series this week with a new set which looks even more like a goldfish bowl.

And while last year's series was billed as 'evil', the theme for this year is 'bad luck'.

One housemate is going to be hit with the Big Brother curse on the very first night.

And an unlucky 13 housemates are being invited into the house instead of the usual 12.

One will be kept apart from the rest and given individual tasks and missions within the house.

The new set will also be the most claustrophobic and paranoid yet.

Heat-seeking cameras will follow any action under the covers while the house has been completely redesigned for the new series.

The Daily Record was given a special preview tour of the new set yesterday at Elstree Studios in the London suburbs.

Next door to the George Lucas stage, where the studio interviews take place and the control-room cameras are located, the house looks like a huge military installation with a grey compound surrounded by barbed-wire and fences.

To get anywhere near the house, described as the safest property in the UK for the next 11 weeks, you have to go through strict security, including being frisked and swept with a metal detector and handing over your mobile phone.

The first part of our tour started behind the scenes, in the nooks and crannies where camera operators and producers can walk around the main house.

Then a hidden door in the wall opened to let us see the main living area.

The first thing you notice is the shocking colour. It's swathed in purple, orange, blue and pink with white carpets.

The set has been altered to increase tension. The walls between rooms have been replaced with transparent but soundproof glass.

You can see your fellow housemates, but still talk about them behind their backs.

Even the dining table and chairs are transparent.

Ominously, it is set for 12, leaving the 13th housemate apparently out in the cold.

To increase the feeling of claustrophobia, there are only 11 beds - two of them doubles - for the initial 13 contestants.

The bedroom's heat-seeking cameras will be able to see bodies beneath the sheets just in case amorous couples, like last year's Michelle and Stuart, try to get secretly affectionate.

And the perspex dining table will stop anyone repeating the love nest antics of those two, who were believed to have had sex under the table.

The only place couples will be able to get intimate on the new set is the newly created Loft. It's an elevated love shack next to the main living area and accessed by a flight of stairs in the garden.

The room, which is big enough for only two or three people at a time, is full of cushions and soft chairs. It's designed as an intimate get-away.

Also in the garden, last year's jacuzzi has been replaced by a heated plunge pool. It sits next to the most shocking redesign - fresh-air showers which are open to the elements.

One of the biggest changes to the whole house is the living room. It is now in a separate building from the rest of the house and is a square of perspex.

It will come into its own for the Friday-night evictions. Housemates will gather with the blinds down so that when the eviction victim is sent out, the rest won't know whether they have actually left the compound or what they're up to.

All of which, the producers hope, will make the new series the most exciting and on edge series yet.

Big Brother supremo Philip Edgar Jones, a Scot, and executive producer Sharon Power said they would introduce the first twist in the first week of the show.

They also confirmed they would be able to alter the make-up of the house throughout the series.

Like last year, they will be using sprinklers to stop people lazing about in the garden. And the diary room has had extra soundproofing to make sure that contestants can bitch in secret.

Philip said: 'The new set-up means that, while you could never escape Big Brother because the cameras were everywhere, you now can't escape your housemates and will be trapped with them.

'The loft is the only place you can go to be alone, by yourself or with someone.

'The showers are outside so it's again all about the transparency and we can control the temperature ourselves.

'It's not a summer camp.'

Sharon added: 'It's all about the unlucky 13th this year. It will soon become apparent the 13th housemate will become the unluckiest ever. Hopefully, it will be very exciting for us to watch but not for them to live through.

'Something will happen that will determine who the 13th housemate is.'Big Brother will always be evil, but this year Big Brother is going to be very fresh and new and different.

'The house is as small as last year and it's been redesigned to give a real sense of claustrophobia and paranoia.

'And our new heat-seeking cameras will mean that there is nowhere to hide.'

She also said that although the new cameras could pick up everything happening under the sheets, they would use editorial discretion to decide if any controversial antics would be screened.

'Everyone loves to see a romance in the Big Brother house.

'But you can't engineer that kind of thing and, although we love to see romance in relationships, it doesn't necessarily mean people having sex.

'Ofcom will be watching so we will decide at the time what we'll be showing, if anything happens.'

Despite the violence which erupted in last year's series, the BB producers said they had maintained the same psychological and screen tests as last year to select their housemates.

'Our highly-qualified psychologist sees everyone as part of the regular selection process.

'And this year there were a few characters that we really liked, but the psychologist said they could not cope with life in the house and he would not allow them.'

The Big Brother team also confirmed that they're in negotiations with producers Endemol for more Big Brother series in the years to come.