Posts featured image in gallery on home page with pagination

I am creating a theme from scratch – How would I go about using each image as an individual post, therefore, being able to add each image to it’s own post category.. AND Have each picture image be in gallery format on the HOME PAGE?

Here is a crude illustration of how I’d want it to look, I already have the header, footer, and navigation set up:

http://i51.tinypic.com/2dtzn2u.jpg

Each time you click on the next page, the homepage retains it’s look, it just shows a new set of images.

I’d want a jQuery lightbox feature, so I’d assume I can just link each home page image to its full size and then just install a lightbox plugin.. But how would I make it so that a post’s featured image would be in gallery format on the home page?

Similar to this theme :

http://polarized3.photocrati.com/

But with the post title above or below the image, which would link the user to the Post Past, with comments, etc ?

I’d also want there to be (pagination? I think that’s the right word) pages and pages of these images, so when the user clicks NEXT or Page 2,3,4 etc there would be a new set of images to display (still on the homepage)

If anyone can point me in the right direction I would greatly appreciate it. If you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.

Thanks