Cameras are one of the highly coveted consumer electronics product every Black Friday and this 2011 Black Friday will be no different from any other.

Whether you are looking for a point-and-shoot camera or even a full-fledged DSLR camera, the time to buy a good camera at a killer price is definitely right around the corner, in fact only weeks away.

As we count down to the biggest camera sales event of the year, here’s some advice for you:

First, do your research and know your specs.  For example, this year I want to pick a point-and-shoot camera capable of at least 12-megapixel photos and 1080P 30fps video.

For those of you who don’t know, megapixels mean how many millions of pixels a camera can capture for a photo.  1080P is the highest standard for taking videos right now and 30fps stand for 30 frames per second.

However, you must remember that not all camera are made the same, you can have the exact same specs on two cameras, say brand A and brand B where brand A might have much better photos and videos.

Generally, you can avoid getting a crappy camera by avoiding cheap brands like AipTek.  I once owned a $150 AipTek camera (even met the founder of AipTek at a conference in Las Vegas) that could do 1080P videos but the audio was just horrible and couldn’t shoot anywhere near darkness.  That lesson cost me $150 and I bought a much better camera weeks after for $150 more.

As a rule of thumb, Canon, Nikon, Samsung, and Sony are probably the best point-and-shoot camera brands and I personally prefer Canon because they do have the best features at the best price points, followed by Nikon.  Now this can differ among people but go ask 10 people you know and I bet most of them will tell you Canon or Nikon.

For DSLR cameras, Canon and Nikon is the way to go.  Samsung and Sony have “hybrid” DSLR cameras that are smaller with different lenses but the cost of the lenses on the hybrids are still far more than getting a regular DSLR camera.   In real life testing, a rugged DSLR (Canon and Nikon) will always outform those hybrid camera.  In 3 to 5 years this might change but for now, hybrids are way over-priced and not that preferable over real DSLR cameras, which use mirror to capture photos instead of digitally processing them.

Personally, I own a Canon 7D with a bunch of different lenses and know a ton about Canon DSLRs which I will get into later this week.

Also, we will be posting more great information about cameras for Black Friday this whole month and the killer deals nearing Black Friday so don’t forget to check back!