Facebook Style user created Albums?

Is there a smart way to give my users the ability to create Photo Albums where the submitted images remain as nodes?

The Gallery2 solution allows users to create albums, but it does not allow me to associate things like +favorites or voting options that drupal can interact with. And here's the kicker: I'd also like the ability to submit multiple images at once to the gallery instead of one at a time.

Here is my desired workflow:

>> User creates image gallery
>> User submits multiple images at once to the gallery
>> User selects cover album (to represent the album in thumbnail view)
>> User types in captions for each photo while on same page.
>> Gallery shows up on user's profile page along with other galleries the user has created.
-- and consequently,
>> random user visits user profile
>> random user clicks on photo gallery
>> random user leaves comments on images and votes or adds to favorites.

My challenge lies in the fact that the images need to be treated as nodes, but the Album also needs to be treated as nodes controllable by the user. Nodes within nodes?

The closest I can get is to make a Content Type called Photo Gallery and add 12 imagefields and 12 caption fields and call the albums up within my user_profiles.tpl.php. The downside is that people can't leave comments on the individual photos because they're not Nodes!

Has anyone come close to a solution for this challenge?