I'm having a bit of trouble sorting through all of the code to see what is necessary to create new users. I want to create a user with a predefined set of permissions. At the same time I need to create a Gallery for only them to view. I looked at the object model tutorial but it seemed to not be what I needed. Any suggestions?

Note that with the term "gallery" we generally refer to the installation. You mean an "album". (see also the glossary on the user guide).

So you want to create that user manually? Then you have to do it, well, manually, unless you want to write a special plugin to create a user and an album.

You need to look at the object model to create albums. Look at the actual documentation or files in zp-core. Same for users which are also covered in a class you find in lib-auth.php.

Also look at the register user plugin as it creates users. As does the federated logon plugin of Zenphoto 1.4.1

If you are doing this manually then you might want to enable the user groups plugin and define a group with the permissions you wish.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I have it working beautifully.