I am going to attempt to carve a cake into a standing converve sneaker. I am fairly new to the cake decorating world. Can I just use a basic chocolate recipe (box or scratch) or does it need to be more like a pound cake? Thanks in advace for the advice

It would probably be best if you used a corss between a pound and regurar/standard (box mix) cake.
My *original* WASC recipe is perfect
http://cakecentral.com/recipe/the-original-wasc-cake-recipe

I have always used my basic chocolate cake recipie without any problems. I bake from scratch so I dont know how well a box mix will do. Hopefully someone else here can answer that. Good Luck!

kakeladi's recipe will work beautifully.

Many people who carve, start by filling between the layers, then freezing the cake. Carve the frozen cake, then crumb coat and finish decorating.

i've worked with both doctored cake mixes and scratch. i think the most important things to remember are to make sure you freeze your cake first and have a denser cake to carve (may not be an issue with the converse cake). i always carve my cakes right out of the freezer-makes a world of difference. good luck