Display Post Title and Button on Hover

Hi,
I am learning while using the Demo site. I have replaced “Our Work” section with “Our Posts” section for illustration purposes, and I added another row towards the bottom of the page to display current posts as well and labeled it “Latest News”
I prefer to use the masonry layout in the Our Posts section, but I want this:
1- When the user hovers over the image, I want the opacity to be changed or possibly over to a grey color so the text will be visible.
2- The Title of the Post to be displayed on hover
3- An Excerpt (which will be chosen manually)
4- Instead of a “Read More” wire button I would like a button that will allow the text to be changed in relation to the post. Such as Vote/Comment/…

5- If 1-4 is impossible via a free version then please refer to the section Labeled “Latest News” towards the bottom of the page. As you see with the first column, I tried to display a targeted “Read More/Vote/Comment…” to each post and I failed. And all I can get it to display is the title and the excerpt. You can see the […] on the other posts, I tried to reset the 55 character size in customization and it had no effect nor did it display a button/link to the full post.

my trial site is at
weare.taxi

Thanks