What can I do to make my basement ceiling look better?

You could put in a suspended ceiling. If you don't want to spend that much, then get some white or grey pain and paint the wood, use conduit cover for exposed wires, it will brighten and clean it up.

I had a painter come in and spray the ceiling with white paint. He had the appropriate equipment and sprayed the joists and the wood on the ceiling which was the backside of the floor above. It totally changed the look of the basement. Lightened it up so very much. It was not very expensive to have it done.

Pinterest has some good ideas, like string lights and painting everything white to brighten it up:

https://www.pinterest.com/explore/unfinished-basement-ceiling/?lp=true

https://www.houselogic.com/by-room/basement-attic/basement-ceiling/

Get a paint sprayer and paint everything dark brown. Looks great and the pipes seem to disappear.

how valuable is your time? Painting it all white as suggested would really brighten the area, but you might instead look into drywalling it all, which will cover all those ceiling joists, pipes, wiring, etc.

I would put up studs, sheetrock and lighting fixtures. Then paint a very light color

We had dark insulation in the front of our basement and it really was dreary. We also have big pipes for our radiators going over the basement ceiling and these are covered with asbestos. We hired a man to put up fake white beadboard and then my husband and I covered all the grungy looking heat pipes with lengths of white shower curtain liners, which we cut into four pieces length wise. We fastened these with white duct tape. Looks neat, bright and clean. Your ceiling just looks dark but it is not possible to tell what that darkness is.

We screwed brown lattice fencing up. It is pieced together, covers wiring and around piping. Comoflagimg and shadows all the ugly mess.