basement ceiling redo

Hi,
This is my first post on this website. We'd like to redo our basement into a fun hangout for my teenage children. We already have a floor, walls and trim. The problem is the ceiling. We have a forced hot air heating/cooling system and ALL of the large ductwork is hanging down way too low to put in any kind of a sheetrock or dropped ceiling in that part of the basement. The other half of the room could probably be covered with sheetrock or dropped ceiling. My question is 2 part: 1)Would it look weird to have half the room covered and the other half exposed? 2) Has anyone ever draped fabric in an interesting way over exposed ductwork? I'm not sure what to do about the ceiling and need help. I can't really go forward with the renovation until I get this problem solved.

 

If it's way too low to start with, 3/4" lower due to installing sheetrock shouldn't hurt a thing and the finished ceiling would look much better than unfinished.

 

Do as Dan0661 says on the flat part. You can make the other parts less obvious by spraying it all flat black (ventilated, of course). You see it in restaurants and office buildings that leave their ductwork exposed. It would look less obvious if your ceiling height is too low to work around with soffiting.