After moving to Los Angeles, California, in 2005, he began writing a film treatment which would eventually develop into an unpublished graphic novel by the title Oblivion for Radical Comics. In August 2010, Walt Disney Pictures acquired the rights. william Monahan worked on the screenplay for a film adaptation. In March 2011, it was reported that Karl Gajdusek would rewrite the screenplay. Attempts to keep the film at a PG rating were unsuccessful leading to Disney giving up the rights, which were then acquired by Universal Pictures which agreed to a PG-13 rating. The $120-million-budgeted Oblivion began filming in October 2011, with Tom Cruise in the lead role, and was released in April 2013.

Kosinski is an alumnus of Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP), currently an adjunct assistant professor of architecture where he helps students in 3D modeling and graphics. In 2008, he spoke in detail about his education in architecture, pushing the technological envelope in commercials and his eventual progression to feature films.

His first major film was the special effects-laden Tron: Legacy. Using high-speed digital cameras, such as Vision Research Phantom Models, the film was in Disney Digital 3D and IMAX 3D, with a release of December 2010.

Kosinski was confirmed to direct the third Tron film in early 2015, but in May of the same year it was announced that Disney had canceled the project. In June 2017 it was announced he was set to direct the sequel to Top Gun.