Tool has signed James Cooper as an interactive director on its roster. Cooper, a former innovation chief at JWT, has been responsible for digital work including the recent Cannes Gold Lion-winning mobile application for Band-Aid featuring the Muppets, Wheaties' Most Valuable Tweeter Super Bowl campaign, and JCPenney's Return to the Doghouse campaign. Prior to joining Tool, Cooper acted as chief creative innovation officer at JWT New York. Previous to that, he was creative director at UK digital agencies, Dare and Agency Republic.

Moxie Pictures has signed director/writer/artist Adria Petty for commercial representation. Petty has directed commercials for brands such as Converse, Target and Volkswagen, and music videos for Beyonce, Coldplay, Kings of Leon, The Ditty Bops, The Veronicas and Regina Spektor. She was recently nominated for five MTV Video Music Awards for co-directing on videos for Beyonce's "Countdown," Coldplay and Rihanna's "Princess of China," and Spektor's "All the Row Boats."

John 'Scrapper' Sneider and Adam Elk have founded Storefront Music in Manhattan to create an environment where clients and composers can interact directly. The pair have previously worked together on music for commercials for Kraft, Chevrolet, IBM and the Windows Phone; Elk is lead singer and guitarist for the Mommyheads, while Sneider has performed as a trumpeter. The pair have also hired pianist and songwriter Chris Merritt, who has already helped compose tracks for Google, Maglite and Time Warner Cable.





Polish post-production and VFX house Platige has launched in the U.S. The newly launched NYC studio extends the reach of the company's Warsaw headquarters to the US market, and will service all areas of CG, animation, and VFX in advertising, broadcast and film. Platige's directors' credits includie Melancholia, Antichrist and Essential Killing, as well as commercial work for Kellogg's, Listerine, Duracell, Orange, Vodafone, Air Wick, Orbit, and Gillette. The US studio is currently working with a number of New York based clients, and has completed projects for History Channel, Nickelodeon, Listerine, and Braun. Matt Subieta is the New York creative director.

MTh (Motion Theory) has added French directorial team Akama to its roster. Akama's Alexandre Ada (left) and Cedric Jeanne (below) joined forces in 2004 and have created work for brands such as Audi, Volkswagen, Lacoste, Kit Kat and more, specializing in blending live-action with 3D, VFX and motion graphics.

Their work has been recognized by Cannes Lions, the Visual Effects Society, the One Show, Eurobest, the London International Advertising Awards, the New York Festival Awards, the Effies, and more.