I am pretty new to this myself as I've only been doing this for about a year, but here are a few things I do differently than yours. I'm sure people do things way different than me and maybe even have better results, but this is just based on my minimal experience.
1. You don't need an exit link on the front page. I make sure any links on my page either link to a link list, one of my sponsors, one of my other sites, or of course the content listed.
2. I agree with Greenie about linking the thumbs and text to the galleries.
3. I don't normally use black, just a personal preference, but any teacher I've ever had in web design always seems to frown on black. I honestly base my template colors somewhat on the color scheme of the paysite I'm promoting. I honestly don't know if this works well or not, but my hopes is it will flow better.
4. Because I'm a lazy bastard I only use one line recips on my index page. It also makes the process quicking IMO.
This is one of my best converting pages I've had. Don't truly know what in particular makes it work, but I've made some good sales from this.
http://jaxfreeporn.com/Carmella_Bing/index.htm
Of course mixed galleries only seem acceptable in TPG, but you get the point I guess.
Just remember I'm still pretty new at all this, but I think I'm getting a little better so you can try experimenting with this stuff and hopefully all goes well. Good luck.