BAN wrote:

2. Paint the sides of the soffits the wall color and the bottom of the
soffit white to match the ceiling? The thinking here is that surfaces
parallel to the ceiling are white, and surfaces parallel to the walls
are colored.


This is what we did. Our soffit is in the middle of the room. not along the
edge. In our room, the ceiling (and undersides of the soffits) are white,
the walls are red and the sides of the soffits are yellow. I wanted to add
an accent color, and it also makes them stand out so that my tall DH is
lesss likely to hit his head on them.