Brought to my attention by Super Punch (BTW I hate their site's new logo. I don't really get the Chimera reference. It should be two boxing gloves or simple a boxer in there logo. You know something having to do with punching. Anyway it's ugly.)Chipp Kidd has "designed" a cover for Marvel's Strange Tales Anthology. He hasn't really designed the cover as he picked a image from one of the artists comics than blew it up and said it was the cover. When I think of someone who has designed a cover I think drew the cover or crafted something. Not taking a image and making it bigger. Now it seems like a great job with great pay to do a very simple task that I believe almost anyone could do. Besides all of that I think that the cover is a stupid choice as I liked Paul Pope's cover anyway so I'll be getting the paperback edition.
Credit where credit isn't due is synonymous with Chip Kidd. There was controversy over why he put his name before the actual writer and artist of the book Bat-Manga! : The Secret History of Batman . When asked the question he answered to the degree of a child,
"Where were you and what were you doing? Did you bring the Bat-Manga over to the U.S.A. ?
Did you get it translated?"
I own the book and once again all Chip Kidd did was picked images he liked and put them in certain places of the book." The Bat- Manga is fun to read as it has strange takes on the characters of the Batman stories and adds a Japanese twist to stories. Another problem with the book other than Chip Kidd's vanity is the disjoined stories in it. Some stories endings weren't put in or just start late without context. I remember that a lot of the stuff was lost or something, but it's still strange to read a comic without a ending.
I also own another Chip Kidd "designed" book Batman Animated. Once again I don't really understand why his name is next to Bruce Timm's on the cover. He just picked what images to put in the book. I really don't know why he should be credited enough to be on the cover. It's fine if he's in the back of the book or thanked and I'm sure he was payed or sadly gets money from the book, but he isn't really doing anything that special. That why I think he has a easy job that I wish I had.