I found this vintage scroll element video tutorial for Illustrator:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itreHFx0Xy4

I'm having trouble with tile cloning. I think I've accidentally checked or unchecked something that is preventing it from working for me. Even though I create 2x2 tiling using the PMM setting, it doesn't seem to want to copy anything as I draw. I was successful in doing a tiling tutorial for a repeating pattern a while back, but now I can't find the tutorial - which is why I think I've unwittingly changed a setting.

Will Inkscape even do this 4-way mirrored tiling with the down-scaled lower part, or am I wasting my time? Any suggestions? If one of you Inkscape pros can watch a few minutes of the video and provide ideas as to how to do this.

Thanks.

So the goal is to draw scrollwork with tiled clones to get a symmetry effect ?

Not sure if this is what you want, but you can draw a square with no fill and a stroke for visibility and group it (yes, just this single object).
Then apply the tiled clones with two rows and two columns and the PMM symmetry.
Delete the clone that is on top of the original.
Now, select the original, open the right-click menu and select "enter group".
When you add/draw new elements inside the group, they will also appear inside the other cloned groups with the desired symmetry effect.

This will, however, not mirror a scaled down version to the bottom.

I can tell you that drawing scrollwork with a tablet like dagubi is much harder than it looks.
Havent tried it with the latest Inkscape 1, but drawing with pressure sensitivity didnt work as well as in AI.
Plus a "brush" is really the Pattern along path LPE in Inkscape, so you need the correct pattern (look at dagubi's website - he sells brushes - you can see a screenshot of the shapes he uses).

This whole symmetry effect is really a bit of a gimmick. You can just as well draw your scrollwork, group, mirror a clone and node edit until you have the desired look on point.
Then later, when you are satisfied, mirror a scaled down version for the bottom part.

Thanks, Konstantin. I will follow your steps. It makes a lot of sense to me, and achieves the end goal. Perhaps the "enter group" step was the crucial step I had forgotten from the previous tutorial. I have a few tablets, but haven't gotten around to pairing them with AI or GIMP yet. They are all so old, I'm not sure they are compatible with either, or WIN 10, for that matter. Yet another project.

I created similar "brushes" to dagubi, kept them to the side, selected then copied the one I wanted to use. From the bit of doodling I managed with just the mouse, the look of pressure sensitivity is basically accomplished via the "brush" that is chosen. It's very possible that he used pressure sensitivity to enhance it further. Some of the "brushes" didn't perform as well as in his tutorial, relative to direction and aspect ratio, i.e., the rose would scale strangely or a leaf would be short and squat. AI is surely tuned better than Inkscape for that purpose.

I installed the new 1.0 64 bit windows version of Inkscape and found it very buggy - it would repeatedly close itself with no warning. After it closed down the third time and I lost my just-drawn "brushes," I uninstalled it and went back to the previous version 0.92.5.

The problem with the group trick is that you easily slip out of the group and there is no way to lock it. Somebody should make a feature request.

I agree the new Inkscape 1 has its problems. You can use the portable (zip) version next to 0.92.5.
As far as i know, drawing capabilities have been improved, but i havent tried yet.
Old tablets are usually not a problem, just make sure you install the latest driver !

Speaking of dagubi and AI: its not the program, this guy is really really really good at what he does !
He just makes it look easy to sell his brushes.