The Work That Made Me: Koby Adom

Koby Adom is a Ghanaian-British film director, writer and executive producer who was born in Ivory Coast but raised in South London from childhood. He is also the CEO and founder of DBK Studios.

Graduating with a Masters Degree from the London Film School in 2017, Koby went on to write and direct his breakthrough short film: Haircut the following year, finishing the film in May 2018. Haircut screened at the London Film Festival and a few places, racked up 900,000 views online and earned Koby a spot on the 2018 Screen Daily Stars of Tomorrow list as well as the Broadcast Hotshot list for 2019. By November 2018, Koby was in Cape Town preparing to shoot three episodes of BBC 1 drama Noughts and Crosses at the age of 28.

Between September 2020 till now, Koby has directed two episodes of Top Boy Season 4 for Netflix, the entire 4-part season 2 of Noughts and Crosses for BBC 1 as well as Executive producing 5 short films from black filmmakers through DBK Studios, funded by Sky Studios, airing on Sky Arts.

He has recently joined UNIT9 FILMS where he will be jumping into the commercial world.

“I'm excited to join UNIT9 because of their intimate approach to film making and their cinematic outlook on commercials. It will be a dream to exercise my dramatic knowledge, with their great reputation, to create a new type of artform in the commercial world.”

Adam Dolman, MD from UNIT9 FILMS said: “We were lucky enough to meet Koby on the short film circuit, having seen his brilliant short film Haircut. It was immediately clear that he was a unique talent, and when he followed that up with Top Boy and Naughts & Crosses, we could see he was ready to make the step into commercials.

He has such a great perspective on life and is one of the most genuinely optimistic and positive people I have come across. We can’t wait for him to get started.”

The music video from my childhood that stays with me…

From my childhood a music video that stayed with me is Missy Elliot's 'Get YourFreak On.' Not only does everyone remember it, but the art production, set and direction is cohesive and bold. It makes an impression.

The music video that made me want to get into the industry…

That would be Vince Staples 'Rain Come Down'. It's clever with its direction and with efficient use of special effects, it creates very realistic images. 

The creative work (film/album/game/ad/album/book/poem etc) that I keep revisiting…

The Bible, I revisit it every day. It sets the standard in my life and it sets the standard of my work. It's also the earliest creative text I ever read.

My first professional project…

My first professional project is Haircut. It was made through Film London's Calling Scheme and chosen by director David Yates for the London Calling Plus Award.

I can honestly say since the Film London showcase in 2018, my life has never been the same. It was the day I could easily call the turning point in my career and life as a whole. I attracted representation from Independent Talent and was selected for many public industry press articles, which boosted my career massively. Within 3 months of the film’s completion, I was in a different country shooting a BBC 1 drama. Currently the film has 739k views online.

The film that still makes me jealous…

A piece of work that makes me jealous I didn't create would be Goodfellas. The story is clear and its core is about people and community. It's beautiful how it explores humanity and what we're capable of. It's mutli-layered with a roller coaster of emotion - it makes you laugh, smile, cry and weaves so many genres into one piece - drama, comedy, thriller, crime. It's outstanding.

The creative project that changed my career…

A creative project that changed my career would be 'Deborah’s Letter', a documentary. I was so close to the subject matter, in my opinion that's the best way to learn storytelling.

Deborah's Letter from Koby Adom on Vimeo.

The work that I’m proudest of…

Some work that I'm proudest of would be 'Housegirl.' Reason being, I shot it in my motherland, even though I hadn't been there in over 18 years. It created beautiful, authentic imagery for the story that couldn't be told elsewhere. The film was screened at festivals around the world including BAFTA-qualifying London Short Film Festival, Africa International Film Festival and Montréal World Film Festival among others.

The recent project I was involved in that excited me the most…

A recent exciting project I'm working on is Executive Producing and Founder at DBK Studios, recently in association with Sky Studios, to have five shorts commissioned by them, all written and directed or acted in by five talented black filmmakers, to be shown on Sky Arts.