Volker Koepp

Koepp was born in Stettin, a German port city. Koepp's early schooling came in Berlin. Koepp passed his school leaving exam in 1962 in Dresden, German Democratic Republic. He studied for two years at the Dresden University of Technology.

From 1965 to 1969 Koepp studied at the Filmuniversität Babelsberg in Potsdam-Babelsberg. Koepp was given a permanent position with DEFA, the East German state-owned film studio, as a documentary film producer in 1970, although he was subject to Stasi oversight and mistrust, particularly with regard to travel restrictions. Koepp produced several long-running documentary sequences, including a series concerning young female workers at a hosiery factory in Wittstock produced between 1974 and 1997, and a series of "landscape films". In 1984 he was awarded the Findling Award for his Leben in Wittstock.

Following the closure of DEFA after German reunification in 1990, Koepp worked as a freelance director, producer and scriptwriter.