Hello Richard,
For a 3rd party camera to work with our platform, you must know if the camera support MJPEG protocol. Besides this, you need to know what it's the URL of the camera in order to get a snapshot and also you need to know what is the username and password for it.
Keep in mind that not all the functionalities of a 3rd party camera will be on our platform ( motion detection, pan/tilt etc.), unless there is a plugin which you can install on Vera, to offer this ( for example for Foscam camera, model number FI9821W you have Foscam HD).
Thank you and Have a nice day